The last time I remember really noticingDemi Moorein a movie was inMargin Call.
Before that film, it wasThe JonesesandMr.
I bring this up because not one of these pictures was released in the last 10 years.
Two of them not even in the past 15.
And she radiates still, ferociously so, when given the chance.
The film is deftly aware too of the transient nature of stardom for women.
The leaves fall and the snow accumulates (in LA?!).
Through it all Elisabeths star weathers, cracks, and finally fades.
Its practically gone by the time the movie begins in earnest and we meet the woman behind the stone.
Shes a smiling and faintly desperate TV personality who hosts a morning aerobics show.
Yet this bit of Frankenstein-ing comes with a catch.
So guess what happens when one decides shed like to stay in the drivers seat a little longer?
Her suffering must therefore be magnified by a multiple of infinity in Fargeats hands.
Moore is fearless in depicting that nightmare.
It is the performance of her career and never has she appeared more nakedly vulnerable, often literally so.
As withRevengebefore it, Fargeat usesThe Substanceto subvert and dilute the male gaze.
There is nothing sexy or titillating about the flesh on display in this movie.
Its sometimes clinical, often comical, and eventually Cronenbergian.
Mostly, though, its honest: Demi Moore is a beautiful woman.
She is simply, factually, beautiful.
This is countered in the bitter irony of Sues experience.
Which is why Qualleys scenes are so cynically dispiriting.
Despite having literally lived a version of this life before, Sue makes no attempts to do anything differently.
Fargeat captures all of this with the heavy air of farce and parable.
Sues scenes are mostly filmed with the glossiness of a car or beer commercial.
She turns her life into a physical sunken place while envying the youth of others.
Whether the Substance succeeds or not, her lost girlhood can never be personally regained.
Rating:
4 out of 5
