The Substance
It's worth it, go for it, I say. You'll only
regret it for a while
dir: Coralie Fargeat
2024
What a year of wonders 2024 is turning out to be. I’m not even talking about all the insanity outside of the world of cinema. Now is not the time for that conversation.
No, I’m just talking about within the realm of films. This here film The Substance has to be about the most bonkers thing I’ve seen in a good long while, yet it also manages to be one of the funniest films of the year. Solely from a filmmaking point of view, it’s an incredibly well put together, intricately constructed, horrifically grotesque and sickening movie. There are incredible scenes, immaculate shots piled on top of each other, with no concern, with no regard for our well being whatsoever.
Of course the focus will be on the flick’s purported all caps blankly stated feminist statements, but the flick is too subversive, too ambitious to be confined by such simplicity. And, honestly, this might sound like a deliberately ignorant thing to say, but beyond the assertion of certain ideas, the film is more interested in pushing the possible or the acceptable than it is in underlining its points.
This is a bit of a genre straddling colossus, because it doesn’t neatly fit into either the science fiction or the horror genres, though its premise is entirely dependent on a heavy sci fi concept, and it is monstrously horrific in its visual (and auditory) depictions. It has a level of set design that would have made the set designers and art directors that worked with Stanley Kubrick green with envy (and possibly litigious for having lifted so many of their designs). There are other elements that mirror the precise striking visuals of make-up and perfume commercials, aligned with an aesthetic that seems like it’s channelling a runway catwalk in Berlin during fashion week.
And then there’s the sound design. Watching a gross older man devouring prawns is one thing, but what if you get to hear it in such a way that scars your soul? What if the sound cues throughout the flick effectively demand your attention, and sometimes feel like a punch in the head, just for good measure?
- Read more about The Substance
- 69 reads