Welcome to another Oscar Film Journal entry here at Enuffa.com! Time for a wacky one....
Today I'll be talking about the outrageous body horror/black comedy film The Substance, written and directed by French filmmaker Coralie Fargeat. This often funny, often nauseatingly disgusting social commentary stars Demi Moore as an aging former movie star turned TV fitness host Elisabeth Sparkle. Elisabeth has just turned fifty and is informed by her producer Harvey (a gleefully slimy Dennis Quaid) that she's being forced into retirement and replaced by a younger model. She then learns of a new miracle medical breakthrough that allows an older person to become "a more perfect version" of themselves on a weekly part-time basis. Elisabeth then assumes the mantle of "Sue" (a glowing Margaret Qualley) and lands the TV fitness host gig, but things start to go awry when Sue doesn't want to go back to being Elisabeth. More plot details I will not spoil here, as it's best to know as little as possible.
But good lord is this movie bonkers. Fargeat wears her influences on her sleeve, and The Substance pays homage to numerous classic films like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Shining, The Fly, Carrie, Requiem for a Dream, The Elephant Man and Repulsion. Or at least those were the ones I spotted, there are likely more. This film swings for the fences and never apologizes, commenting on society's obsession with fame and perfection in beauty but also reminding us that at times the human body can be quite revolting. Do not eat before watching this film.
Demi Moore delivers maybe the best performance of her career, internalizing Elisabeth's constant, bitter battle against the hands of time and conveying almost all of it with facial expressions and eye mannerisms; there is shockingly little dialogue. Even in scenes involving prosthetics her acting never becomes overwhelmed by them. Qualley has very few lines in the film and also delivers a prodigiously physical performance, conveying Sue's short-sighted naivete and later her resentment at Elisabeth's increasingly sedentary and gluttonous lifestyle.
The makeup effects by Pop FX should surely land an Oscar nod; they are mostly practical and disgustingly convincing, in the grand tradition of Rick Baker and Rob Bottin. There were numerous points in the film where I said "They're not gonna show thi-- oh yeah, they showed it...." Fargeat and her collaborators were brutally frank in their depiction of this downward spiral, and the result will definitely not be for everyone.
It's heartening to see such an original, unflinching film like this one get so much awards season praise, and Fargeat now joins the ranks of Robert Eggers, Jordan Peele, Ari Aster and fellow Frenchwoman Julia Ducorneau as a bold young voice in creating truly memorable horror.
I give The Substance ***1/2 out of ****.
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