The Substance is not a film that does things by halves.
Which is ironic, really, because it revolves around two halves of a single whole – when Elisabeth (Demi Moore), a one-time superstar and media darling, begins to age out of her target demographic, she is offered access to the mysterious Substance – which will allow her to live half of her life as a younger, more beautiful version of herself, Sue (Margaret Qualley).
It’s not a subtle premise, but it is an extraordinarily rich one, especially in the hands of director Coralie Fargeat – her first movie, Revenge, remains one of the most confronting and satisfying rape-and-revenge movies in the horror genre, and this premise, while equally blunt, lands with even more of a blow than her debut.
From a technical perspective, there’s an undeniable polish here – this beautifully saturated world, the precision in the framing that keeps Sue peering in to the frame even when she’s not there, the subtle use of the Bluebeard imagery regarding Sue and Elisabeth’s strained relationship. On-screen, the performances are sensational, especially from a career-best Demi Moore. But this isn’t the kind of film you can look at from a technical perspective – no, it’s a visceral, demanding piece that expertly draws out emotion, running the gamut from horror to comedy with ease.
I really appreciate how the movie really just throws you into the deep end from moment one – there’s no attempt to contextualize where this substance came from, the specifics of the world we’re visiting, even the time period that it’s set in, with an odd mix of retro and modern aspects. The focus remains on Elisabeth and Sue, inhabiting this ultra-stylized world that takes the Barbie aesthetic of last year and turns it on its head, taking the pinched, plucked plastic fantasy and shifting it into a nightmare.
But what I love most about The Substance is that it goes there with the critique of female beauty standards. I’ve seen so many movies and media in general try to take on the same themes – the horror inherent in pursuing beauty and youth for women – but they refuse to go any further than, you know, letting their lead actress appear on camera without undereye concealer and a full blowout. The Substance takes it to an extreme which actually feels like a legitimate critique; from the genuinely stomach-churning body horror that fills out the final act (courtesy of some fantastic real effects that could have come straight from an 80s B-movie, and I mean that entirely as a compliment) to the polished, precise soulessness of the workout videos, Fargeat and her production crew delve into that real horror in a meaningful and effective way. There’s a constant sense of through-your-fingers escalation here, that builds and builds to near-comical grotesquerie, perfectly-pitched not to grow redundant through overexposure but to remain pointed and hideous till the movie’s final frame.
When it comes to the true horror of beauty standards place on women, I can’t think of many movies that have taken it to the extent The Substance has gone – Coralie Fargeat’s sophomore feature might be the most visceral, the most disturbing, and the most effective of the lot.
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By Lou MacGregor
(header image via The Cut)
No But Listen 