There’s no shortage of horror films, be they legitimate genre fodder or tales of horrific events, surrounding women. Menstruation, assault, childbirth, etc. have all been utilized by a variety of filmmakers twisting them into creature features or works of demonic horror. Writer/director Coralie Fargeat (“Revenge”) is clearly not satisfied with those previous works; works that might be considered quaint or quiet, contemplative films. Her work of female aging satirical body horror is loud, proud, brash, thoroughly entertaining, and completely insane. Indulge yourself in “The Substance.”
The film follows Elisabeth Sparkle, played by Demi Moore (“St. Elmo’s Fire,” “Indecent Proposal”), a once beloved celebrity and television fitness host who finds herself ousted from her own show on her 50th birthday. She then finds herself utilizing a black-market mystery drug known as The Substance to make herself younger, literally. The drug creates a younger version of herself who goes by Sue, played by Margaret Qualley (“Maid,” “Drive Away Dolls”), who gets her old job, her old fame, and her old body. But as both sides fight for control, despite being the same person, things spiral towards the very worst result.
Fargeat has crafted a world that feels truly hypnotic. Exteriors seem fairly plain and identical to those in our world, and yet each interior shot feels overly designed, trumped up and molded into a borderline horrific, or at least unsettling, version of itself. It results in a constantly shifting environment for these characters to play in, with new camera angles and atmosphere changes radically changing how things feel in each passing moment.
Moore is absolutely fantastic, delivering a career best performance as she dives headfirst into this bizarre world and role she’s taken on. It’s an extremely physical performance that she absolutely nails, one wherein she’s able to completely immerse you in the borderline alien events going on and also drill down into the quieter emotion of these events. Qualley is also fantastic, blurring the line between spoiled brat and woman wise beyond her years. Both performances complement each other perfectly given that, as the voice of The Substance says, they are one person.
Bright neon colors fill the screen, offsets the dimmer darker environments of the night and the progressing horrors of the film itself. There’s symbolism abound here, from a carefully crafted dark hidden closet to the film’s grotesque perspective on food, Fargeat and her team craft a borderline cartoonish world full of metaphor that never doesn’t take itself seriously. Central to its base themes, the film must take everything it does seriously, as it is essentially asking the viewers to leap off a cliff of excess into a pit full of extremes. The only way to sell those emotions and events effectively is to never break from that hold; it doesn’t matter how outlandish whatever you’re seeing is, it’s real in this film.
The dizzying cinematography, utilizing everything from typical Hollywood wide shots to psychedelic trips to close-ups that hail from the Kubrick school of thought, is perfectly crafted by cinematographer Benjamin Kračun (“Promising Young Woman,” “Beats”). It all collides withing itself, mushing into an amalgamation of visual influences and static camera shots. There’s so much lingering on various bodies throughout, and one of the smartest things Kračun and Fargeat do is to not stop. The lingering adds to the themes of beauty standards and feminine bodily expectations, and they don’t twist it into a grotesque way using any creative camera tricks or makeup work. Those moments are simply just shot the same way they’d be on TV or in other movies wherein these bodies are the point of it all, and they just don’t stop.
Much like the effects of The Substance itself, there are plenty of times here where the film’s themes seem to morph and change into varying different ideas. There’s the takedown of beauty standards that is at the core of it all, but there’s also very strong messages about the Hollywood system and drug addiction. Each is so carefully thought out that they all seem equally plausible as “the point” of it all, but none overwhelm the others. Even more than that, the central idea of self-control is beating throughout, as it becomes very clear halfway through the film that every problem Elisabeth and Sue encounter could be solved if they just said “no.”
Music by Raffertie (“One Way,” “The Continental: From the World of John Wick”) thumps and pulses through the film, overloading the senses in much the same way as the visuals. Sound is such an integral part of this film, and Fargeat’s script actually has large swaths of scenes without any dialogue, allowing the visuals to completely take over. It further fuels those central ideas about visuals, looking, seeing, examining, that the film seems so extremely determined to zero in on.
Even the voice of The Substance, a demonically sultry tone brought to life by Yann Bean, only appearing over the phone and in a promotional video, cuts through the film’s literal noise, appearing as sharp and as clear as if it were right behind you, the viewer, at any moment. Juxtaposing against this is a brash and borderline cartoonish performance from Dennis Quaid (“Far From Heaven,” “The Rookie”) as Harvey, Elisabeth and Sue’s TV executive boss, which seems so over-the-top as to just be a literal man-child, dancing through the scenes with a high-pitched voice, munching on food and ogling every woman that walks past him. As the two leading male voices in the film, the wild differences between them are a perfect dichotomy between the world in which Elisabeth and Sue inhabit, further strengthening the film’s sense of place and sense of anger.
By the time things crescendo in the last thirty minutes, which is as insane as you’ve heard, the more squeamish viewers will have switched it off long ago. But that doesn’t change what’s here, because as potentially difficult to stomach as it might be for some, Fargeat’s sophomore feature is a thrilling and daring portrait of female aging, body standards, and deep-seated self-hatred. These themes don’t get in the way of its gonzo body-horror fun, with Morre and Qualley turning in performances almost beyond what either seemed capable of. It’s a deeply sad, angry, loud, silly, goofy, horrific, and, at its core, emotional film. It just so happens to communicate that emotional through squelches, boobs, and squirts of gore instead of teary-eyed third-act confessionals. Give in to your worst instincts and try The Substance. 5/5
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