Film / Do Revenge

Make revenge mommy proud.

Drea: Don't you wanna make her pay?
Eleanor: I don't wanna 'make her pay'! ...I wanna burn her to the ground.

Do Revenge is a teen Black Comedy film starring Camila Mendes, Maya Hawke, Talia Ryder, Austin Abrams, Sophie Turner and Sarah Michelle Gellar inspired by Strangers on a Train. It was released on Netflix on September 16, 2022.

Drea Torres has it all - she's one of the most popular girls at Rosehill High School, is dating the student body president Max Broussard, has gotten a shout-out from Teen Vogue, and has rich friends that help her keep up her glamorous image despite her scholarship student status. But all that comes crashing down when a sex tape she makes for Max is leaked to the entire student body and she becomes a social pariah. While commiserating at Tennis Camp she meets Eleanor Levetan, another teen who's transferring to her school and has faced a similar social destruction a few years ago at the hands of a Rosehill student. When they realize how similar their circumstances are, they team up to seek revenge on their tormentors.

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Do Revenge provides examples of:

• Academic Alpha Bitch: Drea. Because she was at Rosehill on a Scholarship, she had to keep her grades up while also fitting in with the rest of the student body. The result is someone who's excellent at schoolwork and at manipulating people.
  • Max is manipulative and intelligent, he gets good grades like Drea and is also the Student Body President at Rosehill.
  • Eleanor becomes one, as she already has the grades and learns how to control people as well as Drea does over the course of the film. Or rather, she could do so as well when they met.
• Alpha Bitch: The film is full of several.
  • Max is a perfect example of an Alpha Bastard. He's manipulative, head-strong and intelligent, yet equally menacing and cruel. He's sleeping with the prettiest girl of each clique. Then there's the fact that he was able to convince the whole school that Drea's sext was posted by someone who was not him (the only person Drea sent the video to), and when the aforementioned sleeping around was exposed he effortlessly convinced the school that it was all consensual polyamory.
  • Erica is this at the Tennis camp - until Drea frames her and her best friend of having drug problems, getting them both kicked out and sent to rehab.
  • Drea was this for most of her High school years, being an Academic Alpha Bitch, since her scholarship status required her to stay up to date on her studies and her social circle required her to become as intelligent and conniving as they were - those combined influenced her into being a similar kind of snobby to the rest of her clique.
• Ambiguously Jewish:
  • Max, played by the Jewish Austin Abrams, is seen wearing a Star of David necklace and uses the Yiddish phrase "kvelling", though it is possible he is wearing it as a fashion statement. By extension, Gabbi can be inferred to be Jewish due to them being siblings.
  • Eleanor's former moniker of "Nosy Nora" also references an antisemitic stereotype. Her last name, Levetan, may also be derived from Levy a common Jewish name. However, this turns out to not be her original name.
• An Aesop: Rumors aren’t harmless.
• Bad "Bad Acting":
  • After the texts showing that Max is sleeping with a girl from every clique at school are leaked, Drea declares in an extremely deadpan tone "I'm shocked! This is shocking news!" while everyone else is panicking.
  • When Russ goes down on her, Drea fakes a few moans while she cyberstalks Eleanor, then calmly tells him that she came.
• Bait-and-Switch Comment: Drea gets one from Erica when she runs into her at rehab.
  Erica: One of the steps of my recovery program is to make amends with the people who I've hurt. So Drea...(grips Drea's face) Drea, Drea, Drea...from the bottom of my heart, I wish you nothing but the worst for the rest of your miserable fucking life. And...(fondles Drea's earrings) I love your ear-balls. I love them.
• Becoming the Mask:
  • Eleanor soon finds herself torn between Drea, who's honest with her but obsessed with the revenge schemes, and the popular friends that she was trying to infiltrate but seem nice enough. The reveal that she's been playing Drea the entire time adds another layer to this, because their friendship was a mask to begin with before Eleanor toyed with just being friends, and then flips again when Drea forgets her birthday.
  • Drea herself says that she tried to justify the way she acted with her popular friends by telling herself that she was only doing it to survive in society, but realizes she's genuinely a bad person at times.
• Being Evil Sucks: Eleanor and Drea finally come together as friends when they both admit to each other that their revenge schemes and unmitigated cruelty to each other makes them feel terrible and they will always regret it.
• Best Served Cold: Eleanor was outed and wrongly accused of sexual assault by Drea four years before the film, and didn't get a chance to get back at her until now - and when she realizes she has that chance she goes all in.
• Big Bad Friend: Eleanor and Max are revealed to have been this to Drea, each in their turn.
• Bookends: The movie begins and ends in spring, just before the end of the school year.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Drea doesn't remember that she was the girl who had outed and accused Eleanor of forcing herself on her four years ago, because by then she had already become as cruel as her peers in order to fit in. Eleanor even lampshades it saying that she told Drea the entire story, "and you didn't even realize I was talking about you".
• Casting Gag: Rachel Matthews as Allegra, another Alpha Bitch while playing a role antagonizing her BFF Camila Mendes.
• The Chessmaster: Eleanor planned for everything to get Drea to plan the whole revenge scheme because it was Drea all along who started the rumor about Eleanor trying to kiss her and getting her labeled a predator.
• Clique Tour: Gabbi offers a 90s-style one of Rosehill when Eleanor arrives, and Eleanor replies that she'd be offended if she didn't do one. Said tour includes the environmentalists, the drama kids, the Instagram Witches, and the royalty.
• Country Matters:
  • Erica calls Drea a cunt for framing her for a cocaine habit to get her kicked out of tennis club.
  • Drea recreates Eleanor as a "high-status cunt" to help her infiltrate Max's friend group.
• Defiant to the End: By the time of the end of the year party, Drea —knowing that no matter what she says or does that Eleanor is gonna wreck her socially—reveals who Eleanor really is to Max and a few others as her best counter or way to rebel against her.
• Disproportionate Retribution:
  • While it at first seems that she gets just what she deserved, Eleanor and Drea exposing Carissa's drug farm and getting her expelled turns out to be this after it's revealed that Carissa never accused Eleanor of assault and was never Eleanor's true target, although Eleanor did hold a grudge against Carissa for not sticking up for her when she was outed. Downplayed since Carissa was growing drugs on school property, and as Drea pointed out, if she wasn't rich and White the consequences for that alone would have been far worse.
  • Eleanor's actual revenge on Drea, despite the genuinely horrible thing Drea did to her. Despite Drea already having her life uprooted by a sex tape, Eleanor manipulated her into being her friend before revealing her true identity, breaking up her relationship with Russ, indirectly causing her to lose her scholarship and forcing Drea to film herself and her classmates at the Admissions Party under threat of framing Drea's mother.
  • The reason why Max leaked the sex tape was because he felt like Drea never "appreciated" him for helping her rise through the social ranks.
  • Considering that she just had a sex tape leaked out to the entire school, Drea being put on probation for punching Max is a little unfair, even if he was actually innocent of leaking it. Which he wasn't.
• Engineered Public Confession: Eleanor records Max admitting to leaking Drea's tape, and he is exposed to the whole school minutes later.
• "Eureka!" Moment: Drea when she learns she's the one who outed Eleanor long ago and it hits her that Eleanor has been manipulating everything since.
• Even the Girls Want Her: While discussing the headmistress, Drea and Eleanor fantasise about the violent things they want her to do to them.
• Even the Guys Want Him: When Max's friends spread a lie that he and Tara are in an open relationship, two guys (along with a bunch of girls) express excitement at having a shot with him.
• Everybody Has Standards: Drea's former friend group are more than okay with spinning Max's cheating as him and Tara having an open relationship to save his reputation, and even laugh at Eleanor when they finally recognise her as "Nosy Nora". When they find out that he really did leak Drea's tape, they immediately turn on him.
• Everything Is Racist: When confronting Eleanor, Drea tells her that she's a rich white girl ruining the life of a "scholarship student of color" (Drea). Drea apparently doesn't notice the irony that she started the whole thing by spreading a homophobic rumor about Eleanor.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved: Despite knowing that Max leaked Drea's video, his sister Gabbi still loves him and comforts him after his cheating is revealed, although she does dump Eleanor when she defends Max to Drea.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Eleanor is concerned that exposing Carissa would get her arrested until Drea reassures her that Carissa won't because she's rich and white and the headmaster would cover it up to avoid a scandal. It also helps that Carissa is mostly innocent and Drea is Eleanor's true revenge target.
  • After Drea pours her heart out to Eleanor and cuddles with her, Eleanor considered forgiving Drea and giving up her revenge plan. It was only after Drea neglected to celebrate her birthday that she continued it.
• Evil Brit: Erica is a school bully described by Eleanor as a "level of mean I didn't even know still existed" and played by the English Sophie Turner, keeping her own accent.
• Evil Is Petty:
  • Downplayed. While Eleanor has a 'very good reason to want revenge against Drea, not only does she continue her plan even after Drea was suffering when after a nude video of her went viral online, but Eleanor persists in even after she causes Drea to lose her scholarship, reveals that she was faking being friends with her the whole time and breaks her up with Russ. When Drea refuses to cooperate, Eleanor even threatens to frame Drea's mother for drug. She is also this to Carissa, willing to expose her ex-girlfriend's drug operation despite knowing and understanding how afraid Carissa was and why she abandoned her.
  • Also this with Max. The reason he leaked out Drea's video was because she didn't appear grateful enough for him being her boyfriend.
• Fallen Princess: Drea's popularity went down the drain after Max leaked Drea's tape, she loses her friends because of it.
  • Erica. She's the most popular girl at tennis camp, with a bright future ahead, planning to attend Stanford...then she gets framed for drugs, kicked out of camp, and stuck in rehab (where she develops an actual drug addiction).
• Faux Affably Evil: Eleanor. Once the truth is revealed, she still remains her talkative and bubbly persona as she taunts and threatens Drea.
• Forceful Kiss: Carissa (actually, Drea) claimed Eleanor once did this to her, painting her as a sexual predator to other people while simultaneously outing her. This inspires Eleanor's quest to get revenge.
• Forced Out of the Closet: Carissa outed Eleanor years ago after claiming she'd tried to unwillingly kiss her. Eleanor wants revenge for the fact. It turns out Drea had really done it however.
• Foreshadowing: There are a couple scenes that foreshadow Drea's true nature and backstory with Eleanor:
  • When remembering her, Drea mocks Carissa as a granola-munching lesbian before Eleanor glares at her. It's far from the first time she did or said something homophobic to Eleanor (though if one hadn’t known, they might think this was just Eleanor feeling betrayed that the girl who supposedly outed her eventually came out herself).
  • Rather than being scared or contemptuous of her, Carissa is only slightly surprised to see Eleanor again. Carissa didn't do anything that would warrant a complicated revenge scheme, but someone else does.
  • Eleanor gives Drea a few side-eye looks throughout the movie, such as when Drea says narcissists are too focused on themselves to realise they're being manipulated and when she notes that there's one to go after Carissa's defeat. The first quote applies to Drea all too well.
  • Eleanor looks contemplatively away from Drea while snuggling with her in bed and responds in the affirmative when Drea says she's just like her.
  • Drea sarcastically accuses Russ of stalking her, and he jokingly confirms it and that he plans to murder her. He isn't, but Eleanor had been stalking her and injures her.
  • When Drea and Carissa first interact, Carissa reveals that they've met before and recalls the insult Drea called her, something Drea clearly has no memory of. Carrissa isn't the only person Drea doesn't remember meeting and being cruel to before.
  • One of the quotes featured in the classroom is "When one woman strikes at the heart of another, she seldom misses, and the wound is invariably fatal" by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos.
  • After Max and Tara are able to spin the story around by claiming they are polyamorous, Eleanor is seen smoking by herself with a blank, contemplative look on her face. As soon as a distraught Drea storms into the room, her expression immediately changes to one of concern, but not organically; it looks more like a switch flipped inside her head and it’s a clear indicator that she’s just acting.
• Full-Name Basis: Eleanor's emotional support bearded dragon is named Oscar Winner Olivia Colman and is always referred to as such.
• The Ghost: Drea's mother is discussed by several characters but never seen. Justified in that she's a nurse who often works nights and strange hours, so she's not often around even when Drea is home.
• Hate Sink: Max Broussard is the rich, sexist and self-absorbed ex-boyfriend of Drea Torres who leaked the sex tape that she made of herself for him to the whole school because he felt threatened by her power and dominance and falsely claims his phone was hacked to be absolved of any wrongdoing. Max then uses the incident as well as his already powerful platform to launch a group to empower girls when really he's only interested in continuing to bolster his own image—and takes many opportunities to cheat on his girlfriend Tara too, much like it's discovered he did with Drea before her. While everyone is squarely on Max's side, it's eventually revealed that they all suspect how truly awful he really is and only did so because he proved too influential to challenge or go against—which makes it even easier for everyone to eventually turn completely against him once his deception is fully exposed.
• In Love with Your Carnage: Relatively tame example but at the end, Drea tells Gabbi about everything that happened with her and Eleanor. When Eleanor and Gabbi reunite, it turns out she thinks it's awesome.
• In with the In Crowd: Drea gives Eleanor a makeover so she can infiltrate Max's (formerly her) circle of friends and take him down from the inside.
• Ivy League for Everyone: Rosehill is stated to be a boon for any student trying to get into Ivy Leagues, and Drea specifically is gunning for Yale from the moment we meet her. It's to the point that when a party is held exclusively for people who got into Ivies, basically every character who's been seen in the film so far is there. Subverted in that Drea fails to get into Yale due to her revenge schemes being leaked to their admissions board, and when she's offered the opportunity to get back in their good graces she chooses to forgo it as she's become disillusioned by the entire idea.
• Ironic Echo:
  • When Eleanor asks Drea towards the start of their plan if Max will realize they're manipulating him, Drea tells her that "Narcissists are too busy thinking about themselves to realize they're being played." When Drea asks Eleanor how she was able to manipulate her the whole time, Eleanor uses the same line as explanation.
  • Drea sends Eleanor out to humiliate Max and says "Make revenge mommy proud". When Eleanor reveals the full scope of her revenge on Drea, she quips "Did I make revenge mommy proud?"
  • After Drea uses Carissa's psychedelic mushrooms to drug everyone at a dinner, she also tips the headmaster off to the source, explaining to Eleanor "It's called double assurance, sweetie. Look it up". In the climax, just when it appears Max will get away with everything, Eleanor reveals she recorded his confession with a hidden backup camera. She then repeats the same line to Drea.
• Jerkass Realization: After humiliating Eleanor at a party, Drea comes to apologize, saying she always thought she was doing terrible things to fit in at school and "this isn't me." But she now realizes this is her and is truly regretful for the kind of person she was with Nora and others.
• Karma Houdini: Despite drugging their classmates and Eleanor crashing her car into Drea, neither of them face any consequences for their actions.
• Kick the Dog: Eleanor and Drea do terrible things throughout the movie, but two things they do to each other while being friends stand out.
  • Drea forgets Eleanor's birthday and then crashes her surprise party— when Eleanor asks if Drea remembered or would have if the circumstances were different, Drea admits she wouldn't have remembered and insults Eleanor for wanting her to.
  • Eleanor saying she doesn't believe Max leaked the video of Drea, and claiming Drea overreacted, is pretty cold - Max's own sister (who overheard the argument between the two girls) calls Eleanor out on it and claims that she believes Max leaked it too.
• Laser-Guided Karma: Max started the movie off by leaking a video of Drea naked to the rest of the school. Eleanor takes him down by recording him confessing to leaking said video and playing the confession to the rest of the school.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: In the mid-credits scene Drea sneaks into Russ' workshop to apologize, he asks her how she got in, and she tells him not worry about it. Similarly, Eleanor waits for Gabbi to happen by at their old spot but Gabbi takes too long and she falls asleep waiting for her.
• Metaphorgotten:
  Drea: Looking back, it was a classic Icarus story: I flew too close to the sun and my boyfriend leaked my sex tape.
• Mushroom Samba: Drea uses the psychedelic mushrooms that Carissa was secretly growing to drug the entire senior class at a special dinner for them, leading to everyone losing their minds and flailing about the green while the two tip off the headmistress and steal Max's phone.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Upon exposing Eleanor as a means of fighting back against her scheme, Drea succumbs to her remorse and grief about all the times she hurt her and refusing to hurt anyone else just to make Max pay, Drea destroys the camera in the bow, choosing to accept whatever fate befalls her if it means no one else suffers.
• Not Helping Your Case: After Drea frames Erica for being addicted to cocaine, she starts loudly screaming that she's been framed. It only serves to make it seem more likely that she's on cocaine at that moment.
• Once More, with Clarity: After realizing she was the one who outed Eleanor years before, Drea starts thinking as we see scenes from the film, now showing how Eleanor had set up this "accidental" meeting with Drea and was working to set her up along with the rest the whole time.
• Penny Among Diamonds: Drea's from a working-class family at a school for extremely rich kids, including Eleanor.
• Pet's Homage Name: Oscar Winner Olivia Colman the beareded dragon is named after, well, Oscar-winner Olivia Colman.
• Political Overcorrectness: A majority of the students are "fake woke", advertising themselves as allies of important causes for social clout while failing to actually help said causes. Gabbi points out that the protesting environmentalist students all use single-use plastics regularly. Max tries to deflect blame from himself over Drea's video leaking by forming the "Cis Hetero Men Championing Female-Identifying Students League", clearly turning a bunch of actual words into meaningless buzz to make himself look better. The students also ostracize Drea after her humiliating video was leaked (which should be an issue of female autonomy) rather than pitying and comforting her (though they don't antagonise her over it and are disgusted with Max when it's revealed that he was behind it after all). The school also has a designated "safe space" for students who get offended.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Max delivers one to Drea at the end for her manipulative tenancies and to rub in that he leaked her tape.
• The Reveal: It was Drea, not Carissa, that started the rumor about Eleanor holding her down to kiss her, and Eleanor had tricked Drea into helping plot her own downfall.
• Rewatch Bonus: When Drea comments that being outted by "one of your own" is particularly brutal, Eleanor lets out a scream of frustration. This is because she’s pissed that Drea doesn’t even remember what she did after being told the exact story.
• Running Gag: Allegra and the Instagram Witches allegedly levitated someone at a sleepover once, and most of the time when they're shown they're attempting to recreate that - including at the year-end party where everyone else is doing drugs, having sex, and getting into fights.
• Scholarship Student: Drea's only able to go to Rosehill because of her scholarship, and the Headmistress threatens to revoke it after she assaults Max.
• Schoolyard Bully All Grown Up: Drea is this to Eleanor and is her true revenge target.
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: Erica only appears in a few scenes, but she's dropping plenty of F-bombs in all of them.
• "Strangers on a Train"-Plot Murder: Since Drea and Eleanor have nothing connecting them to each other when Eleanor arrives at Rosehill, Drea suggests the two take down each other's bullies. Partially subverted since the two of them still assist each other when they can, and because the Eleanor and Drea do have a connection from their past - but Drea's since forgotten.
• Taking You with Me: Drea believes by the time of the party that Failure Is the Only Option and that no matter what she does, Eleanor is gonna destroy her. She then makes the decision to destroy her as well by revealing who she really is to Max and some others.
• Title Drop: When they figure out how to team up, Drea phrases it as "We should do revenge!"
  Eleanor: Is "do revenge" even the correct grammar?
  Drea: Oh I'm sorry Schoolhouse Rock!, are you dragging my sentence structure right now?
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: Eleanor is the Tomboy to Drea's Girly Girl.
• Too Much Alike: Max claims that the reason he leaked Drea's sex tape was because he couldn't stand the fact that they were both, in Max's words, "conniving, selfish sociopaths who use everyone around them to get exactly what they want", and he had to destroy her.
• Unusual Pets for Unusual People: The quirky Eleanor has an emotional support bearded dragon named Oscar Winner Olivia Colman.
  Eleanor: My therapist told me to get a puppy, but I prefer to keep my companions thick-skinned and cold-blooded.
• Vengeance Feels Empty: Played with. Eleanor admits to Drea in the climax that ruining her life isn't nearly as fun as she thought it would be, but they both decide to expose Max because he's a genuinely terrible person and finally gets his just desserts.
• Villain Has a Point: Max is right in his final speech that Drea is conniving, selfish and manipulative - exactly as he is.
• Villain Protagonist: Both Drea and Eleanor use their social wits and status to manipulate their targets and make them miserable. The reveal doubles down on this, as Drea was the one who ruined Eleanor's life first and Eleanor has spent the entire movie trying to pay her back.
• Villainous Breakdown: Max has an epic one when the tape of him taunting Drea about releasing her sex tape is revealed, alternating from both cussing out his classmates and vehemently denying it.
• Wham Line: Drea confronting Carissa over outing Eleanor long ago.
  Carissa: That is so weird, first that she told you it was me and second, you didn't call bullshit...You seriously don't remember? Drea, you were the one who started that rumor! Yeah, Eleanor is Nora Cutler from day camp?
• Wild Teen Party: The Acceptance Party, a rager thrown by the senior students who got into Ivy League schools. It's packed with drugs, booze, sex, and even fistfighting, and all phones are surrendered at the door to stop anything from leaking on social media.
• Yes-Man: Erica's friend Jessica, whose only lines consist of her tearfully repeating everything Erica says as she's kicked out of Tennis Camp.

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"I think we may be fucked up soul mates."