Besides his quasi-consistent visual aesthetic, the similarities between Sean Durkin’s feature-length debut, Martha Marcy May Marlene, and his follow-up, The Nest, are not screamingly evident.

And yet, both flesh out victimized women internally screaming in anguish over the domineering men controlling their lives. Elizabeth Olsen as the titular Martha, and The Nest‘s nested (alternate definition: “arranged in a hierarchical structure”), but rarely-nestled Carrie Coon are held captive by their captivation with a seemingly-captivating bloke. Despite the initial comfort fleetingly-derived from their corrosive masculinity, each movie chronicles their plight to break free of the shackles of their delusional — or is it deluded? — perception of the manipulative dicks dictatorially puppeteering the macro and minute terms of their existence.