Director Coralie Fargeat possesses a hellish gift: the ability to make a long shot of a needle suturing Demi Moore's mangled back just as nauseating as a close-up of Dennis Quaid eating shrimp. The Substance is a sinful flick, dredged from the funniest depths of hell, and I adored it.
The film opens on a whimsically centered, clinically lit egg – a perfect encapsulation of the film's tone. A syringe injects the egg with something green and viscous, causing the yolk to shudder and multiply. I shuddered too, instantly adding the film to my personal "egg horror" canon (a microgenre I've avoided since Cool Hand Luke and my subsequent aversion to hard-boiled eggs).
From the back of the theater, a few of us groaned and laughed from the opening scene. We tried to contain ourselves, but by the end, the entire audience was a chorus of instinctive reactions. A symphony of "AWW NOOO's" accompanied a flurry of flailing arms covering eyes, ears, and even noses.
Whether it was head-on shrimp, poreless youthful skin, sizzling food, or arterial spray worthy of a GWAR concert, everything was rendered utterly disgusting. The Substance elicited gasps, cackles, and retches in such rapid succession that breathing, let alone eating my popcorn, became a challenge. From the seemingly innocuous to the overtly gory, this timely satire embraces extremes. Fargeat skewers the follies of pride and gluttony, taking pointed jabs at Hollywood beauty standards. It's fantastic, it's repulsive, Dennis Quaid steals the show, and its release coincides perfectly with Ozempic's rise to popularity. I hope they offer a 2-for-1 deal.
Previously:
• Great 1950s horror sci-fi novel, The Mind Thing, now on Kindle
• Jordan Peele's shares his guide to horror movies
