“The Substance” – Movie Review

The Substance – Movie Review

What. Did. I. Just. Watch.

French director Coralie Fargeat directs her second film, this time starring Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley, and Dennis Quaid. It is a fast-paced, twisted, gory tale of self-worth, rebirth, and aging through the lens of fitness model Elizabeth Sparkle (Moore) who gets fired from her lucrative job because others see her as being past her expiration date. Her life is flipped upside down, and she suddenly feels cutoff from everything she knew and from the drug of fame.

Through a series of strange events, she births a doppelgänger named Sue who is everything she used to be. They are two parts of the same whole, and Elizabeth once again has her fix.

But like any addiction, it comes at a price.

This movie stunned me, actually. It’s like a laser-focused, biting commentary on the expectations of fame and the pains of aging. Demi Moore may have delivered the performance of her career, and Margaret Qualley asserts herself as a versatile talent. She even keeps up with veteran Dennis Quaid, who plays the sleazy, slimy, grotesque and over-the-top Harvey, a man only interested in making money and sucking up to the shareholders. All three form a perfect union onscreen for a film that in many ways hearkens back to the works of David Lynch and early David Cronenberg.

Speaking of Lynch, The Substance reminds me of a clip of him I saw on YouTube once:

Watching The Substance feels like finding your way through some dream… or maybe a nightmare. It doesn’t always make sense in a concrete way, but much like a dream or fantasy, it makes sense at the time. Where does the substance come from? How exactly does it work? It doesn’t really matter, because the film lets you know right away that it isn’t the type of movie where both feet are planted firmly on the ground.

And at the same time, a large chunk of the visual effects do seem to be grounded in reality. The practical effects extended a very large nod to the 80s horror flicks that inspired the movie: The Shining, The Fly, The Thing. All of these and more are present, yet the film also is completely its own Thing, no pun intended.

I should also mention the excellent sound design, which contributes a great deal to the impact of some of the grotesque special effects mentioned above. It would even be worth arguing that the reverse ASMR, highly detailed sound design and fantastic claustrophobic camera work is at least half of why the film works so well.

If you have a strong stomach, go see it.

Rating: 4.5/5 stars

TM Rush