SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for “Blink Twice,” in theaters now.
In Zoë Kravitz’s directorial debut, paradise is not quite what it seems.
At the beginning of “Blink Twice,” roommates and cocktail waitresses Frida (Naomi Ackie) and Jess (Alia Shawkat) find themselves working at a party for Slater King, a charming, handsome, vaping billionaire tech CEO played by Channing Tatum.
Frida is enchanted by Slater, and, by the end of the night, she gets herself and Jess invited to vacation on his private island. Slater has been laying low these days, as Frida watches an interview in which he apologizes for some vague misbehavior in the past. He vows to do better, blah blah blah. It doesn’t seem to faze Frida. She’s too busy obsessing over her “anailmals,” her animal-themed fingernail art.
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On the island, Frida and Jess are joined by a handful of other scantily clothed women and Slater’s inner circle, which includes his sister Stacy (Geena Davis), who also serves as his personal assistant. At the beginning of the trip, everybody surrenders their cell phones. Every day, they drink champagne, lounge by the pool, eat gourmet food and take psychedelic drugs. Seemingly the only threat on the island is the venomous snakes that hide in the grass.
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Soon, Frida begins to notice weird things happening — she keeps eyeing dirt under her fingernails, and a stain on her dress mysteriously disappears. The days start to blend together, and this tropical dream turns into a nightmare when Jess is bitten by one of the snakes. Slater and co. assure Jess that she’s not going to die, and they leave her to rest as the party continues.
The next day, Jess begins to freak out, insisting to Frida that this trip is not what it seems. Frida brushes off her concerns: She’s caught Slater’s attention, and — counter to how they are told to conduct themselves as cocktail waitresses — it’s nice to not feel invisible for once.
While navigating the luxurious huts across the island, Frida keeps bumping into a housekeeper tasked with killing those pesky snakes. The housekeeper repeatedly yells “Red rabbit!” when she sees Frida and, in one scene, offers her a sip of a mysterious green liquid. Frida recoils at the taste and immediately discovers it’s the snake venom.
Soon, Frida comes to a terrifying realization: Where’s Jess? She hasn’t seen her friend since after the snake bite, and the rest of the girls on the island seem to have no memory she was even there in the first place. Repressed memories begin to surface. It all starts to make sense: Each night, the women take drugs given to them by Slater and his entourage and are seen running through the grass with their white gowns billowing behind them. Each morning, they wake up with no memory of what happened the night before. The snake venom counteracts the amnestic effects of the drugs, as visions of unspoken horrors trickle into Frida’s mind: Under the influence of the drugs, the women (and one young man, it’s implied) are assaulted and raped, again and again. Stripped of those traumatic memories, they unknowingly vacation with their rapists. In one flashback, the men kill Jess — whose snake bite will soon reveal the truth — in front of the women.
Frida tries to explain what she has discovered to another woman on the island, Sarah, a survival show alum played by Adria Arjona. Sarah doesn’t remember Jess, but she trusts Frida enough to drink the venom, which has a foul taste. Together, they hatch a plan to enlighten the other women on the island: mix the green venom with tequila and serve it poolside in shot glasses. Still, the women are conscious of the fact that even if they do make it out alive, their stories will likely not be believed. “What’s crazy is getting on a plane with a bunch of dudes we don’t know,” says Sarah, forecasting the arguments that will be used against them.
At the pool, even the uptight and frantic Stacy, who is usually scouring the island in search of menial tasks, takes some venom-infused shots. The memories bubble up. But while they fill the other women with rightful rage, Stacy violently confronts Frida. “I didn’t want to remember,” Stacy says. Of course, she knows of the crimes. She helps facilitate them. If Slater is Kravitz’s interpretation of Jeffrey Epstein, Stacy is her Ghislaine Maxwell.
Frida manages to kill Stacy and flee. The men are away on an excursion, so Frida slips into Slater’s quarters to retrieve the phones. Instead, she finds a box of Polaroids, capturing all of the women brought to the island.
At dinner, Frida and Sarah bide their time as they wait for the venom to kick in for the other women. With their traumatic memories returned, the women go on the attack, fighting their rapists set to Beyoncé’s anthemic “I’m That Girl.” It’s a total bloodbath, during which a horrifying realization penetrates Frida’s memory: This isn’t her first time on the island. Years ago, Frida was violently assaulted by Slater and dragged across the ground as dirt caught under her nails. Nails adorned with red rabbits.
By the end of the melee, only Frida, Sarah and Slater remain. Slater almost revels in the destruction, as Frida and Sarah gain the upper hand and burn his estate to the ground. But, as revealed in the film’s final scene, they didn’t kill Slater. Instead, Frida has filled his vape with the psychedelic drugs and waits for authorities to rescue them, preparing to exact the ultimate payback.
At a gala similar to the party in the opening sequence, it’s not Slater but Frida who is honored. With her rapist by her side, Frida has seized the role of CEO of Slater’s tech empire and married him. It’s an ending both triumphant and disturbing, as Frida actualizes the motto she shares with Jess at the beginning of the film: “Success is the best revenge.”
