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The Substance (2024)

Pretty girls should always smile.


This is why you NEVER insert a USB into your computer unless you know it's from a trusted and reliable source. Coralie Fargeat goes all Cronenberg. Not David though, more Brandon, for this grisly and highly uncomfortable and morally questionable look at female beauty.

When a fading celebrity (Demi Moore) finds that age is more than just a number in the glamorous and lucrative world of entertainment, she struggles to accept that maybe the world has moved on and whilst she had fun, the inevitability that the old rascal Time has come a-knocking cannot really be argued with.


So with the help of a kindly (?) attractive male nurse, she finds The Substance, a dark, black market drug, offering exactly what she is looking for. The chance to be young again. You know, that thing that cosmetics companies have been promising to do for desperate and deluded women for generations. After she completes the procedure, which conveniently can be carried out alone at home, enter Margaret Qualley, her younger self, borne graphically from the spine of her older self. Grim, right? Well, wait just a moment...


Bradley Cooper had none of this nonsense when dropping pills to make him supersmart in Limitless. There was no pursuit of youth, just to be mentally more acute. Arguably, senility and its playful little brother dementia notwithstanding, you don't get stupider with age, as evidenced there, but this does not seem to be the case for (predominantly) women by all accounts. This is not normal, obviously, otherwise we wouldn't be watching this on a cinema screen. It would be happening in your bathroom, probably. Most women I know at this age are a good deal more graceful about the onset of SAGA holiday cruises and comfy sandals.


I think we to are assume the regular lascivious, sweaty gyrating is for ironic purposes then? Not for something to take away from the message that when watching, both hands should be openly on view at all times, just incase you're mistaken for one of the guilty humans responsible for the continuation of what is essentially an eloborately conjured charade of visual relief, for the purposes of profit. You're very bad. Complicit, even.


Demi Moore is absolutely stunning and her transformation is nothing less than jaw-droppingly thrilling. This is overflowing with layers of moral fortitude and lack thereof. Fargeat, approaching her fifties herself, clearly knows of what she speaks and had maybe a little too much fun showing us our own warts and all.


The direction is outstanding, depicting the madness and the chaos at one moment, and the rollercoater lucidity experienced by Liz and Sue at others. The third act itself is quite something to witness as the body horror really goes full tilt. Whether you would suggest that the result is more grotesque than the idea itself is open to question.


We could have guessed that none of this was going to end well. The message of being careful what you wish for is a common one that resonates with audiences everywhere and this is no less true here, even if the message is rammed down our throats much less subtly here. Even Bradley got chased by a crazy Russian, after all.


Film of the Year, so far.Recommended, but don't forget your sickbag.



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