There are always two aspects to everything, the positive aspect, and the negative aspect.
But we hardly get to see something positive coming out of someone’s obsession.
The reason behind this could be morality, one tends to forget morality when they are obsessed
with something or someone. Our movie of the day revolves around the aforementioned lines.
Welcome To Movie Recall. In Today's video,
we will be going through the 2017 Thriller film : “Submission”.
It's Time To Recall. Let's Get Started.
Turn On Subtitles and Spoilers Ahead! The story starts with Professor Ted Swenson
going to college. He has published a novel that has earned him a little fame and currently,
he is a creative writing teacher at Euston College in Vermont.
He thinks that he will leave the university as soon as he gets his 2nd novel published. However,
things have not exactly gone the way he expected, and he has been stuck at the college for the last
10 years and now he is a tenured professor. In the next scene, we see a discussion going on
under the supervision of Ted. Everyone is giving their opinion on the novel,
but their opinions do not seem to be very mature or valid for that matter. This is when a girl
named Angela speaks out and gives her opinion on the novel, she seems to like the novel and puts
up some valid points. The way she defends the novel and her stance, it really impresses Ted.
When the class ends, Angela gives Ted the novel she has been writing and requests him to read
the first chapter and give her feedback on how well she has written so far.
After college, we see Ted going into a hospital to see his wife Sherrie who is a nurse.
After that, Ted along with his wife attends a group meeting at the college. The meeting
is going on under the supervision of principal Benthem. He addresses the group and talks about
the new policies and guidelines regarding the teachers harassing their students. The next day,
Angela goes to Ted’s office to see him, she has a conversation with Ted over novels.
This is when she sees the novel written by Ted, she tells him that this novel is her favorite,
this is the novel that helped her get over the death of her father. She then keeps on praising
Ted, she mentions how she feels inspired by him and how he has been doing a great job as a writer,
she basically keeps going on and on like a fangirl. She then asks him to
review the first chapter of the novel she is writing; the novel is called ‘Eggs.’
In the next scene, Ted is sitting in the library, trying to work on his own novel. But his phone
keeps ringing again and again. This is his editor calling but he keeps ignoring the call.
Eventually, he gets annoyed by everything and stops working. He then picks up the chapter that
Angela requested him to read and starts reading that. He gets really impressed by the writing
and the story. He is so impressed that he cannot stop thinking about it even when he gets home.
He keeps thinking about Angela and her novel even when he is with his wife. Ted is now unable
to get Angela out of his mind. He again reads the story and seems fascinated by the whole thing.
The next day, he meets Angela and gives her feedback on the novel.
He tells her that she is onto something. He says that she has done a really good job.
They are still having this conversation when another professor named Magda joins them.
She does not seem to be too thrilled about seeing them having such a delightful conversation.
She does not really join the conversation and just leaves after exchanging pleasantries.
As soon as she leaves, Angela gives Ted another chapter to read. Ted reads that chapter sitting at
a restaurant while he drinks. He is still reading the chapter when Magda joins him again. Both of
them have lunch together. They talk about Angela and Magda is impressed to know that Angela is now
doing something worthwhile by writing content that is not considered tentative. If we use
simple words, content that is clean and does not include erotica. She tells Ted that she once got
to read Angela’s poems when she took her class. She says that the poems were really vulgar.
She further adds that Angela actually insisted on making it a donation to the college library.
Though it did not sit well with the librarians as they found the poetry about a phone sex
worker rather obscene, they decided to keep it as an act of good faith. After lunch,
Ted directly goes to the library and checks out that poetry book which primarily consists
of erotic conversations between a phone sex worker named Angela 911 and her clients.
But right now, he does not have the time to read it because he has to go to a social gathering.
As soon as he gets there with his wife, all the professors of the college keep pestering
him about his novel and he gets annoyed but his wife keeps covering for him to make sure Ted
remains in a good mood. Ted then ends up lying that the work is almost finished. But when he
is asked about the theme of his novel, he tells the theme of Angela’s novel instead of his own.
His wife gets a little confused hearing this because she has already read Ted’s work.
At the dinner table, all the teachers are talking about putting a stop to the harassment.
They all discuss the new campus sexual harassment rule-book and how political correctness is
affecting their teaching style. They say that they want to teach their students in a safe place and
in a safe environment. But Ted says something very bold while putting up his opinion on the
matter and ends up making everybody a little uncomfortable. After dinner, when Ted and his wife
leave, his wife teases him about how he did not think before what he said, but at the same time,
she admires his confidence. When he gets home, he finally starts reading Angela’s book which
he picked up from the library. He gets so touched by the novel that he actually starts
painting the whole image of the characters and the story in his mind. The image is that a girl
is waiting for a man in the dark of the night, a man who can do her in this dark night. As Ted is
thinking about all these things and simultaneously reading the book, his wife calls him to bed.
The next day, Ted goes to college, but he is not able to focus on anything, the only thing that he
can think about is ‘Angela 911’. He is not able to focus on anything said by his students that day.
After the class ends, Angela again comes to see him, Ted praises Angela's writing and encourages
her to write more, she, in turn, gives him increasingly erotic later chapters of her novel.
When Ted is reading that novel, he suddenly stops reading as he realizes whom the novel is actually
about. He calls Angela and asks her to see him tomorrow. This is when Ted’s wife comes in and
asks him who is he talking to? Ted lies and tells her that he was talking to Magda. The next day,
Angela’s mother and Stepdad come to college and see Ted, they ask about how Angela has been doing
and inquire about her progress. Ted is all praises for Angela in front of her parents
and they seem very satisfied with Angela. After Angela’s parents leave, Ted meets Angela,
she tells him all about her family and the death of her real father. Ted consoles her saying that
though life has been unfair to her so far, she has a lot to look up to in her upcoming days.
That night when he is reading Angela’s novel, he starts imagining himself and Angela as characters
in the novel. Reading her novel, which is about a teenage girl sexualizing her science teacher,
he starts imagining himself as that science teacher. Just as he is imagining all these erotic
scenarios with Angela, he stops himself before he goes too far. He then calls Angela, but a guy
answers the phone and upon hearing a male voice, Ted hangs up the call without saying anything.
The next day, when Angela meets Ted, she apologizes to him as she thinks that reading her
novel might have made Ted uncomfortable. Ted asks her to take it easy by saying that this is normal
for a literature professor. Then Angela tells her that her computer is broken so she has not been
able to finish the next chapter, Ted gets a little off hearing that he is not going to be able to
read the next chapter. He decides that he will buy Angela another computer, on the way to the market,
they get to know each other well. They get the computer and then Ted drops Angela home.
When they get home, Angela insists on him coming inside to help her set up the new computer. When
Angela is setting up the computer, she is bending over, and Ted cannot get his eyes off of her butt.
Then he tries to control himself by focusing on other things in the room. Due to some issue with
the computer, Angela is still not able to copy the new chapter and she starts getting annoyed.
Ted tries to calm her down and that involves some touching between the two.
This is when Angela comes onto him and they quickly begin to have sex. However,
before they can finish, Ted's weak tooth comes out and they humorously decide to postpone sex for
some other time. However, Ted requests her to keep whatever happened in this room between the two.
Angela agrees but Ted still feels guilty for everything, when he is leaving, he runs
into one of his other students who gets curious upon seeing Ted coming out of Angela’s room.
When Ted gets home, he is unable to stop thinking about the story of Angela’s novel
and he again ends up imagining the two in amorous activities. He starts to get really unsettled
and finds himself unable to understand how to deal with everything that has been going on.
The next day in the class, Angela criticizes one of the students’ work,
at which that girl gets annoyed and says to Ted that Angela is always criticizing others’ work
and when it comes to her work, she does not even let anyone see it. When the class ends, Angela
comes to Ted and apologizes for her behavior in the class. She tells him that she has been
upset because Ted did not give her any feedback on the latest chapter that she gave him to read.
Ted then calms her down and apologizes to her. Angela then requests Ted to show her novel to his
publisher. Ted says that he will think about it. In the next scene, Angela showing great courage
shows her novel to the class, but it does not go well. Everybody makes fun of it and criticizes it.
This incident very badly hits Angela’s confidence. Ted then defends Angela’s novel and tells everyone
that they should be ashamed of themselves for acting like idiots. He even says that
Angela’s novel is the best of them all. He gets so worked up that he ends the class in anger.
Just as he leaves the classroom, he calls his publisher and asks him to set up a meeting
after thanksgiving. In Vacations, Ted’s daughter comes to see them, they are all talking about
her studies when Ruby takes the topic toward the history of mental disorder in their family. Ted’s
father committed suicide due to a mental disorder. Ted gets angry and his wife changes the topic.
After vacation, Ted goes to New York to see his publisher who has been waiting for Ted’s
work very impatiently, but to his surprise, Ted gives him Angela’s novel instead of his own. His
publisher figures out that something intimate has been going on between Ted and Angela and that’s
why he wants to do her this favor. Ted denies it and leaves. When he gets home at night, his wife
is still up waiting for him. She tells her that a student called, and she was asking about Ted.
When Ted comes to the college, Angela comes to him and asks her about the novel.
He says that her novel is with the publisher. But then he tells her the truth, he says that
the publisher is showing no interest in her novel. He then tries to make her understand that she is
a little girl yet and that she will get plenty of chances to get her novel published. But these
things just piss Angela off and she reveals her true self. Ted tries to explain the situation
to Angela, but she becomes too furious, she starts shouting that she only slept with him in hopes of
getting to a reputed agent through him. Ted gets shocked at this; he says he didn't think their
relationship had anything to do with business and Angela angrily leaves. Ted gets really
hurt as he sees Angela storm out of there. When Ted is going home, he gets a call from the
university board and learns that Angela has filed a sexual harassment suit against him,
and she recorded their previous day’s conversation as proof. He then confesses to his wife that he
cheated on her. Everyone, including his wife, blames him, and, after his students and some
faculty members testify against him, he loses his job, marriage, and reputation. However,
Angela gets a call from Ted's agent, who now shows interest in her work in light of the controversy.
Fifteen months later, Ted is seen writing his memoirs in a cafeteria and when he sees a woman
at his table reading the 'Eggs' novel, he asks her how she likes the book.
During the whole story, we kept thinking that Angela was obsessed with Ted.
No, she was not actually obsessed with Ted, she was obsessed with getting her novel published.
That obsession led her to go to lengths that were extremely immoral. In fact, in simple words, what
she did was extremely cheap. She lures an innocent man to have sex with her in order to further her
cause. In the pursuit of her gains, she ends up destroying everything that her teacher has,
his job, his reputation, and most important of them all, his family life. Indeed,
obsession can make you the person even you yourself come to despise one day.
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