Sanctuary
That is the initial set-up of Sanctuary, a psychological thriller that takes place over the course of one night, starring only two actors and set entirely in the same hotel room. The power dynamics between the handsome executive (Christopher Abbott) and the beautiful hired woman (Margaret Qualley) seem straightforward at first, but a series of twists shift those dynamics round and round so many times that the audience is just as in the dark about who is really in control as the characters themselves.
Rebecca (Qualley) dons a blonde wig and a business suit at first, putting Hal (Abbott) through a series of humiliations that include taking his clothes off and getting on the floor of his bathroom to clean behind the toilet. It's revealed that Hal is about to take the role of CEO at the company once run by his recently-deceased father. Rebecca berates Hal for his sexual history and predictable daddy issues, and the submissive Hal seems utterly unprepared to run his own life, much less a giant corporation. He seems to genuinely care about Rebecca, showing her genuine affection even as she continues to dominate him within their set of pre-arranged rules (no contact, no sex acts).
Eventually the twists start coming and everything you thought you knew about Hal and Rebecca is brought into question. What's clear is that Hal wants to terminate their arrangement to avoid any details leaking out that might jeopardize his new role as CEO, and Rebecca isn't going to let go of her cash cow without a fight.
The marketing (and above summary) might make it seem like the movie would be a very erotic and possibly sexually graphic affair, but director Zachary Wigon (working off a script written by Micah Bloomberg) is much more interested in exploring the psychological profiles of these two characters who come from very different worlds, but ultimately still want the same things. It's a movie filled to the brim with dialogue, featuring very little action (in every sense of the word).
The two leads are perfectly cast. Abbott is making a fine career portraying handsome, powerful men with puppy-dog eyes and barely-hidden vulnerabilities. Qualley is particularly excellent, especially considering she is asked to do quite a lot, often shifting from doe-eyed sexpot to mischievous manipulator to unhinged psychopath, sometimes all within seconds of each other. The movie only works as well as it does because the two leads have a great chemistry, and it doesn't hurt that they are both very pleasant to look at as well.
Even though the movie doesn't drag per se, it does fall a little too in love with trying to keep the audience guessing, resulting in a few too many twists and turns that start to feel like the story filling time. Like a dominatrix itself, the movie wants to delay gratification until the final climax, but all of the games leading up to release get a little tiresome. The ending does eventually bring things together nicely, if not a little too cleanly, but at this point the themes the movie is trying to explore have been a little lost in the madness.
It's an interesting experiment that didn't go quite far enough in my mind, but the two leads are excellent and there is still plenty of tension and lots of surprises that entertain, even as those very things do most of the heavy lifting against a story that might not have enough there to sustain 90 minutes of runtime.
