"The Substance" - Review

Workout star of a prime time show, and hottest thing on the planet, Elizabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) has it all! But all good things must come to an end: she's 50 and, as made abundantly clear by her slithery boss Harvey (Dennis Quaid), there's no room for her in this industry now. Despondent and miserable, she finds her way back in: far from pulling a Mikey Saber, she instead uses "The Substance", to create a "newer", "hotter", "better" version of herself (Margaret Qualley), to ride high once again in that industry. All seems well, she has to follow a few rules and success seems given: Stabilize every day, swap every seven days, and remember that there is no she and her, only "Us". Fame, youth, beauty and more, are only an injection away...

Rightfully compared to David Cronenberg, I'd agree but not for the reasons people think when they immediately think Cronenberg: it has that almost asexual, clinical dissection of glamour and sex, that horniness and sleaze eyed up with an almost alien fascination and disgust which feels more akin to fascination than perversion. It's less titillating and more inquisitive and ponderous.
The whole movie is gorgeously shot, very French.
It has frequent wide angle lenses, immaculate colour design (the yellow coat and orange hallways are a particularly striking set of images), making for frequently bright, memorable imagery. There are a lot of wide angle and fish eye lenses, usually with an exquisitely ghoulish Dennis Quaid (playing his best Ray Liotta, RIP) far too close, adding disgust and discomfort effortlessly. And then the surgical, looming, disgusting gross body horror you came for is (whilst underplayed for a majority of the film, we'll get there...) neatly done, slow, effective, gross.
The sound design is the star of the show: I never want to hear a man eating shrimp ever again. Fucking gross There's a lot of food and consumption and devouring imagery and metaphors. The film descends into addiction, the biases and loaded decks and prejudices against women, the hypocrisy and vulgarity of the entertainment industry and society's double standards for women, and to this extent casting Demi Moore (giving one of her best performances in a lifetime) is an inspired piece of parody. She is great in this: her cookery scene is great fun, and encapsulates the movie well.
The final act is where you, I, and everyone with a semblance of understanding of horror movies, Cronenberg, body horror and pacing are expecting it to come together:
Oh boy it does that!

Deliciously gross, surprisingly rather "Society" inspired stuff (I kept humming the "Eton Boat Song" in my head, you'll see why...) comes alive in the finale: gross, bloody, manic, and a suitable slice of madness from what we have seen so far. It's not as unhinged as something like "Cuckoo", and is a more reserved, collected, orderly affair with something to say, but if you have the patience for it, and enjoy the Soska Sisters remake of "Rabid", I can recommend this.