Elizabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) was once a famous actress: she won an Oscar and also got a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, but Elizabeth celebrated her fiftieth birthday as the host of a TV show with aerobics classes: the times when she shone in the movies, long gone. Yes, and aerobics had to be stopped, as it turned out: just on her birthday, the producer of the show Harvey (Dennis Quaid) announced that Elizabeth was fired because he had to find a younger presenter.
On the way home, Sparkle, distracted while driving, gets into an accident, in which she was, fortunately, almost unharmed, but at the hospital a nurse slipped her on a flash drive with an advertisement for a drug called “Substance.” The video promises that, with the help of this drug, Elizabeth’s body cells will divide and create a young version of her based on her matrix.
The matrix and the young version will not be able to exist in parallel: the matrix, that is, Sparkle herself, will be unconscious, receiving adequate nutrition through an IV, and the young version will have to put herself in with a stabilizer every day, which she will get it from the body of the matrix. After seven days, they must change: the young version, using a dropper, must exchange with the matrix, after which the young version will lie unconscious for seven days, and Elizabeth will enjoy her life in retirement to quit
The actress had nothing to lose, so she decided to use “Substance”. At the same time, she was warned that she and the young version were one. And that the exchange must be done only once every seven days, otherwise there will be irreversible consequences.
Elizabeth took in the substance herself, and sure enough, after a while, a young version appeared through the gap in the spine and took the name Sue (Margaret Qualley). He is young, beautiful and good looking. Harvey immediately replaced Sparkle with Sue, and he is so pleased with her that wonderful prospects are opening up for the girl.
While Elizabeth lies unconscious, Sue enjoys her fast fame and lives life to the max: partying, drinking and fucking all kinds of people muscular handsome. However, she doesn’t really want to change with Elizabeth after seven days.
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The director of this film is the French director and screenwriter Coralie Farge. The only feature-length film she has previously directed is the 2017 action horror The Revenant, which was well received by critics (as much as 92% on Rottentomatoes), but received lukewarmly by audiences (59 %).
Her new film “Substance” was screened at the current Cannes Film Festival, created a sensation there, received a 13-minute applause, was nominated for the Palme d’Or and for Best Screenplay, and won the film the award for Best Screenplay.
At the box office, the film did very well, it received the highest rating from critics – 90% on Rottentomatoes, and the audience received it well – 74% on Rottentomatoes and a rating of 7.5 on IMDB.
Viewers are not unanimous in their assessment of this film. Body horror is, you know, a very specific genre; not all viewers can easily stand how human bodies and body parts are transformed by skilled makeup artists, but here, let’s face it, at a special moment of the imagination of the the film team goes wild in creating a special monster right up to the end. However, let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
There are a lot of cinematic references in “Substance”, especially for viewers with good vision. The director herself said that she was particularly inspired by the novel “The Picture of Dorian Gray” by Oscar Wilde, but such a symbol would never have occurred to me, because the point here is entirely between – different But classic body horror films like Cronenberg’s “The Fly,” Carpenter’s “The Thing” and Yuzna’s “Society” immediately come to mind, and the film also includes direct quotes from Kubrick’s “The Shining.” and “Carrie” by De Palma.
The idea of painting is cool. An old star (in the producer’s understanding) gets a chance to be divided into two parts: old and young, and what comes out of this is original, new and brilliant. It is clear that the young beauty is in no hurry to take a week’s rest at a time when everything is spinning and shining around her, and she wants to enjoy this pleasure without end! At the same time, he begins to irreparably damage his own matrix, which inevitably leads to his own death, because he cannot exist without the matrix that nourishes him. and stabilizes it.
And when things get very, very bad with stability, then I wonder what it will turn out in the end, and then some interesting spectators would have to be taken out of the hall, although the Bagel cat and I, so easy to survive even”Defenders“Sarik Andresyan, and they didn’t look, that’s how good we are!
It must be said that the director is already about a third of the film carried away into this particular bloody-ugly guignol, but that is why it is a guignol, that nothing can being there is too ugly and too bloody, so we don’t do that. submit this as a complaint, but here one cannot help but admit that some of the events were clearly drawn out: it is clear that Coralie Farge wanted to fully enjoy the bloody orgy, but it was a little too much – only in terms of time, Mr Judge, only in terms of time.
No, of course, I would prefer that the events become more psychological than visual, but here the genre of the film clearly shows “body horror” (how to translate it into Russian – “body horror”, or what?) – Well, then you get body horror, why are you complaining?
Another thing is that before this type of films were still in a very specific field, and did not cause enthusiasm at film festivals, but with the current state of film production, body horror is Really original and well done as breath already. of fresh air: that’s what they were in for such a treat and the first award that mocked all for a script for a film whose plot fits in a line or two, and all its charm lies in the visual part only.
And this joke applies, of course, not to “Substance”, but to the screenwriters, moved by endless strikes, who today only know how to give a kill, a remorseful kill , an unrepentant killer, two klutzes who robbed a bank and a woman with a tragic adventure, and all this behind endless comic book movies come together in one arachnid Batman revenge moving in all directions riding on catwoman, where the sequel sits on the three and drivesa quadriquel.
Demi Moore, who stars in this movie, did a special job. But in general she is a completely fearless actress, which was confirmed again by some of the films in which she starred, which showed a certain tension between the heroine’s body and her intentions. In the film, her heroine turns fifty, Demi herself who was sixty-one at the time of filming, she is in excellent physical shape, and filming a movie like this, of course , special challenge.
But she herself wanted it, she persuaded the director to choose her, and, at a meeting in Paris, she gave Coralie Farge a copy of her memoirs “Inside Out”, in which Demi spoke openly about her attitude towards her body at various stages of her film career.
And being a woman who keeps a close eye on herself and her physical condition, at the same time appearing in a body horror film, where make-up artists and special effects specialists do something to completely crazy with her body – this requires complete self-denial, that’s what Demi showed.
The young version of Elizabeth was played by Margaret Qualley (who, by the way, is Andie MacDowell’s daughter), who I loved in the film”Beauty on the run“Here she was more of a symbol – a young version of Elizabeth, and the makers made fun of her no less than Demi Moore’s heroine, and Margaret, of course, needed a lot of courage to take the part in such a picture. .
I usually do not like the actor Dennis Quaid anywhere, but here his representative is completely grotesque and even slapstick is very good, the character is very funny. And yes, his name is Harvey – apparently this is an homage.
Visually, it is wonderfully staged (cinematography by Benjamin Krakun). A colorful and bright interior, a large Elizabethan apartment with wide windows, elegant and very expressive (and not as in “Favorites“) using ultra-wide lenses makes a good impression.
It is also impossible not to take into account the amazing events made by Elizabeth’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame: at the very beginning, almost the entire life of the actress was revealed excellently, and in the end – the Bagel cat and I gave up. obedience standing.
Well, in general, I really liked it, although body horror is not exactly my genre. But here the idea is very good, its implementation, and the actors are more worthy of it – class, just class. Against the background of the current cinematic scene, there is only a bright spot. Intentionally clear, excessive, off scale. But this is exactly how it was designed, and this is exactly how it was implemented. We appreciated it. And we understand and share the joy of critics. Finally, someone took it and hit us right in the eyes and right in the brains – and rightly so!
Official trailer:
