You and me lying on the tile floor
Trying to keep cool
Restless all night
Sweating out the poison
As the temperature climbs
Staring up, up, at the hundred-watt light that burns above
You name one thing about us two, anyone could love
We roll out the red carpet
When rotten luck comes down the road
Five, four, three, two, one
Watch for the flash
Something here will eventually have to explode
-HAVE TO EXPLODE, THE MOUNTAIN GOATS
when this movie came out, i was fascinated by it. The cast is incredible, It was directed by the same director as my favorite movie EX MACHINA, and most of all people were talking about it all over the place. this was before i fell in love with David Lynch and other more abstract masterpieces, and it was fun as hell to watch a movie that constantly forces you to think critically. i would be lying if i said i ever fully understood everything about this movie, so lets give it a re-watch and so if we come any closer to understanding this incredibly dark and beautiful movie.
Lena, a biologist and former soldier, joins a mission to uncover what happened to her husband inside Area X, a sinister and mysterious phenomenon that is expanding across the American coastline. Once inside, the expedition discovers a world of mutated landscapes and creatures, as dangerous as it is beautiful, that threatens both their lives and their sanity.
Due to a poorly received test screening, David Ellison, a financier at Paramount, became concerned that the film was "too intellectual" and "too complicated," and demanded changes to make it appeal to a wider audience, including making Natalie Portman's character more sympathetic and changing the ending. Producer Scott Rudin sided with Garland in his desire to not alter the film, and thankfully Rudin had final cut. Its always a good sign when the money men behind the scenes think a movie would be to challenging for its audience, and its 100% of the reason this movie is still one of my favorites.
I honestly forgot how scary this movie is right off the bat. this movie is nowhere near linear, and starts at the ending. At U.S. government facility Area X, biology professor and Army veteran Lena recounts her expedition to a zone called the "Shimmer", which emerged three years ago from a nearby lighthouse after it was struck by a meteorite. all we know is everyone who went with her is either dead or simply vanished, and we can tell by just how shell shocked Natalie Portman is that she saw some really fucked up shit. the dialogue is minimal, the pacing is perfect, and you really get to marinate in the dread. ands that undoubtedly the atmosphere this movie is going for, nobody knows what is happening, everybody is scared and unsure, and everyone knows that they are fucked.
the only reason this movie works at all is all of the incredible actors on set. Natalie Portman as Lena, Jennifer Jason Leigh as Dr. Ventress, Gina Rodriguez as Anya Thorensen, Oscar Isaac as Kane, Benedict Wong as Lomax, all of these actors give Oscar worthy performances. you never get the feeling that anyone is reading form a script whatsoever, and everyone in this movie feels like a real person. i love a movie that can focus mostly on the strength of its characters without relying on crazy effects or gore, and this movie nails it.
sure would be a shame if anything bad happened to all these amazing characters...
Plot wise, this movie is packed with intense and memorable scenes. Kade returning home, the serval mutated animal attack scenes, Kade slicing up a fellow soldiers stomach, the finale at the lighthouse, and so many more subtle moments that really make this movie work. normally the heavy use of CGI would bother me, but i am a massive fan of all of the effects in this movie. The visual effect team was made up of many of Garland's collaborators from his previous film, Ex Machina, including VFX Supervisor Andrew Whitehurst, lead VFX house Double Negative and Milk VFX, plus special makeup effects by Tristan Versluis. its a wonderfully dark mixture of absolutely beautiful and shit your pants terrifying, and it nails both of those moods without giving you whiplash. honestly, everything i have to say about this movies plot can be boiled down into "its awesome", but the themes are far more fun to explore.
Once we enter the shimmer about 30 minutes in, this movie really dives head first into its themes about self destruction. the best example of this is the line "it was basically two bereavements. one for my beautiful daughter, and one for the person i once was." No one in the movie says, “It’s about cancer,” but it’s clear within the first fifteen minutes that the premise of Garland’s movie is basically, “What if the Earth—that is, the planet itself—got cancer?” and what is cancer at its most basic level? self destruction. Everything gets messed up because of mutations, and as Radek later explains to the group, they’re basically inside of a prism, so everything is refracting. Minds, bodies—everything gets screwed up because that’s what cancer does to a healthy body.
TLDR; this movie is amazing.
and also gave me a panic attack. it didn't help anyway...
10/10
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