In Coralie Fargeat's bloody action thriller Revenge, Jennifer (Matilda Lutz), a young American woman, travels to a remote vacation home surrounded by desert with her married French boyfriend, Richard (Kevin Janssens). Two of Richard's hunting buddies, Stan and Dimitri (Vincent Colombe and Guillaume Bouchède), arrive early for the group's planned trip the day after they arrive, causing immediate tension and unexpected horrors.
The 2017 release of Fargeat's wild movie completely changes the way the rape/revenge horror story is presented, presenting itself as a novel and distinctive addition to the genre. Jen is put through hell as Fargeat's heroine, but her suffering only makes her more determined to survive, shocking the men who naively underestimated her. Even the most ardent fans of the genre may feel uneasy in their seats during Revenge's explosive scenes, which firmly establish it as one of the gorier contemporary horror films. The group has a promising night of partying, but the next morning puts an abrupt end to the good times. Jen is sexually assaulted by Stan while Richard is away running errands, and Dimitri, who is present, decides, unfazed and unconcerned, to drown out Jen's screams with the television and go swimming. In exchange for Jen's silence, Richard offers her money and a job in Canada when he returns. Richard hits Jen when she says she'll call his wife, then chases her into the desert. The three men catch up to Jen as she approaches a cliff's edge, and Richard offers to call her a helicopter before pushing her over the edge. After being pushed off a cliff, Jen wakes up with a branch through her stomach. Seeing her lighter nearby, she uses it to burn through the shrub and escape, but the branch is still lodged in her abdomen. She manages to turn the tables on her attacker. When the men discover that Jen's body has vanished, they decide to finish the job, but Jen kills Dimitri first before taking refuge in a cave nearby. Jen cuts the branch, numbs herself with a dose of peyote that Richard had earlier asked her to keep hidden, cauterizes her wound with metal from a beer can, and then passes out. After experiencing a series of death-related dreams, Jen awakens with the beer's phoenix logo imprinted on her skin and emerges from the cave feeling revitalized and prepared to wreck havoc on the remaining men. After killing Stan, Jen follows Richard back to the house for a bloody standoff.
Jen's mental and physical development becomes the center of the revenge plot. In Fargeat's early depictions of Jen, the young woman is portrayed as a bubbly blonde who is almost satirical in nature and willing to put up with her boyfriend and his intrusive friends no matter how uncomfortable they may be for her. Jen changes, her sweetness disappears, and a rage she was unaware she possessed comes to the surface when Stan rejects her initial friendliness and insists that she owes him more. The phoenix on her stomach emphasizes her ability to survive and regenerate, mirroring her transformation from a soft-spoken mistress to a merciless killer. Jen used to go to great lengths to win over the men, but now she puts just as much effort into making sure they don't succeed. Richard orders the helicopter and enters the shower before realizing Jen is at the house. As Richard tries to flee the room, Jen seizes the chance to shoot him in the stomach. Richard quickly arms himself and fights back, setting off a cat-and-mouse chase through the confusing house. When Jen slips into his blood, Richard catches her and starts to choke her while griping about how women are always fighting. Richard is forced to drop her after Jen forces her hand into his gunshot wound, which frees her up to reload and shoot Richard to death. Jen steps outside covered in blood and sand, turning as a helicopter approaches. Jen contrasts earlier images of bright clothing and her admitted desire to stand out by appearing armed and almost camouflaged. Jen had adjusted to her situation and gained the upper hand by exchanging her lollipops for a shotgun and her headphones for binoculars. Jen has completed the circle and is now standing by herself in the desert, back on top of the cliffs she was pushed from. She is prepared for whatever the approaching helicopter may bring, whether it be her escape or more trouble. Jen has quite literally emerged from the ashes, fulfilling the prophecy of her rebirth given earlier by the phoenix branded over her wound. As they approach their remote getaway, Jen is first seen sitting behind her boyfriend in a helicopter, sucking on a lollipops and grinning. Unlike many victims in the rape/revenge subgenre, Jen is not portrayed as being innocent. They frequently brag about being chaste in an effort to make their impending sexual assault worse. Jen is conscious of and appears to embrace her sexuality. The all-too-familiar "you were asking for it" speech from Stan is delivered, but Jen is not easily shamed into silence. Additionally, Fargeat refuses to expose Jen's nudeness. Instead, she shows Richard in several scenes while undressed. In the final scene, Richard is not only naked but also incredibly exposed; in the horror genre, women are frequently in this position.
Fargeat gives viewers a welcome break from the agonizing scenes of sexual violence against women, which the rape/revenge sub-genre has long been criticized for by focusing more on Jen's survival than her assault. The theme of female suffering through the male gaze, which has persisted in the horror genre for too long but is now being rapidly dismantled by fresh, original stories, is avoided in revenge.
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