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Unpacking "Martha Marcy May Marlene"

If you’re new to The Rebel MFA Way, welcome! This is an essay in my Trigger Warning Series — where I unpack and dive deep into the intersection of trauma and storytelling of film, tv, and fiction. I love having conversations around these topics, so share your thoughts in the comments!

Warning — there are spoilers for Martha Marcy May Marlene in this article.

I’m a sucker for cult stories. There I said it. Why? I think it’s because I have such a hard time putting myself into their shoes that I find myself drawn to the challenge. It’s an especially poignant experience when the storytelling is woven seamlessly with the cult’s larger story and presence.

That being said, I’ve realized there are two main kinds of cult stories. The first is what I call the “Spell and Threshold” which is storytelling around a cult member falling in with the cult and/or the escape from it. The second is what I call the “Aftermath” which focuses on the after effects of being in the cult and the reintegration or re entry into society. Martha Marcy May Marlene is the latter type of cult story though we do get a bit of the former too. Really though, this film is such a fascinating look into the emotional and mental aftermath of what it means to have been in and then left a cult.

The Trauma Line

This movie gave me the ickies. You know when you’re watching something and you know where it’s headed? And you know you’re not gonna like it? Yeah, that’s my experience with this film. Why did I watch it then? Well, I’m a fan of Elizabeth Olsen and this was her debut film. I really respect her role choices and I wanted to see how she would play such a tormented role. (Spoiler alert: she was fantastic!)

Although this is a slow burn of a movie, it really is a fantastic case study for this type of essay. During flashbacks, we see how Martha (who is christened “Marcy May” by the cult leader, Patrick (John Hawkes) is seduced and attracted to the way of life offered to her. We watch as Martha is lavished with attention and with her “specialness.” She is made to feel like a “chosen one.” It’s like watching a train derail and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. On the outside, we see how insecure Martha is… how much she adores being noticed and seen. We understand how predatory men like Patrick and his “recruits” find and compel young girls to fall in line.

The “ick” factor rises when we witness the “cleansing” as Patrick calls it. And I bet you already know where this is going. The rape is horrendous given that the “matriarch” (Maria Dizzia) in the family drugs Martha so she is “pliable” for Patrick and then after all is said and done she says to her:

“I know you feel like something bad just happened, Marcy May. But you have to trust me, that wasn't bad.”

It’s sickening, really. The scene itself wasn’t gratuitous — but it was just enough to be disgusted and to understand how these leaders twist and disfigure what consent means.

All of that would be enough, but in the case of Patrick’s cult — they don’t work or have jobs. Instead, they break in to strangers homes and steal and loot. In one scene, we see Patrick hurt one of the homeowners who interrupts their theft. The violence visibly marks Martha and it’s from that moment on, we see her start to doubt her place in the cult.

This backstory sets up what happens after Martha’s escape from the cult and her re-entry into “normal” life.

As you can imagine, it does not go over smoothly. Martha is moody, confused, constantly fearful, boundary-less, ignorant of social expectations.

Watching Martha struggle in the scenes with her sister makes me angry and sad because her sister Lucy (played by a fabulous Sarah Paulson) and Lucy’s husband Tom (Hugh Dancy) don’t know what has happened to her. And like many survivors, Martha doesn’t want to tell them. The reasons are varied I’m sure, though she doesn’t verbalize them. But in the vein of realistic re-entry of a cult survivor, we see the disconnect between the victim and those who have no clue what they’ve been through.

To the regular observer, Martha’s actions seem completely outrageous and wrong. Such is the case in a scene where Martha gets into the bed while her sister is having sex with her husband. This is the exchange:

Lucy: Why would you think it's okay to come in here like that?
Martha: I don't know. It's a big bed. You guys were on the other side.
Lucy: You can't come into our room when we're having sex. That's not normal. It's private.
Martha: Sorry.
Lucy: You don't need to apologize. Just - I need you to understand why it's not okay.
Martha: Okay.
Lucy: Do you?
Martha: Yeah.
Lucy: Well?
Martha: Because it's private and not normal.
Lucy: Oh, God.

What Lucy doesn’t know is that back at the cult compound — communal sex was normal…encouraged in fact.

It made me heart hurt every time Martha does something like that only to be told something is “wrong” with her. That she is “psychotic” or “crazy.”

In my work with trauma survivors, specifically a few cult survivors, its moments like these that are the hardest. As a survivor, you have one foot still in the world that you were forced to engage in, and another foot in a different world with different expectations. It’s enough to drive anyone mad.

Then of course, there are the natural fears that cult survivors feel after leaving or escaping. That feeling of looking over your shoulder all the time. Wondering… waiting. Ultimately, this paranoia is what pushes Lucy and Tom over the edge by kicking Martha out of their house. And like so many survivors, Martha is left to figure out how to exist in a world that doesn’t know what to do with her.

Storytelling

Honestly, the storytelling in this is pretty straightforward but it works. It has a very stripped down, raw and gritty feel to it, which mirrors the tone of what Martha is going through.

I really respected Sean Durkin’s stylistic choice to use the flashbacks to fill in gaps, but he doesn’t let it become the heart of the story. He wants us to focus on Martha’s re-entry and relationship with herself after escaping and I think that choice is what makes the whole thing work as a character study.

Something else I really loved about this film was Durkin’s choice to pare down the cult’s ideology, religious views or goals because in the end, it doesn’t really matter. What matters is how the cult recruits, contains and coercers its members while remaining in power. What also matters is how its members slip out from under their grasp and re-enter the world after being forever marked by cult trauma.

Want to see what films could be up next for this series? Check out my Letterboxd account → https://boxd.it/pktaA