“The Substance” - TIFF24 Film Review
This review was originally posted on Film Obsessive.
Since its premiere at Cannes earlier this year, The Substance has been the talk of the town. Many films throughout history have blazed out of Cannes, only to be met with lukewarm fanfare when they reached the general public. It feels pretty safe to say that’s not the fate that will befall The Substance. The film kicked off the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival’s Midnight Madness programming, and its subsequent public screenings sold out even before the festival began. Those who have seen The Substance often have a dazed look in their eye, only capable of muttering something along the lines of, “you gotta see it.” Everything you’ve heard about The Substance is true: it’s nasty, bloody, absurd, and sends a jolt of electricity straight to your system.
Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore, far from Ghost) built her career in the ’80s as an actor and fitness instructor. She’s an old talent in a world that always wants younger, hotter, and newer. That’s executive Harvey’s (an unhinged Dennis Quaid) only goal: to find the next Elisabeth Sparkle. But she’s not ready to let all the fame and infamy go that easily. Elisabeth is presented with a phone number for a product called The Substance. The synth-heavy promo promises the creation of a younger, better version of those who use the drug. After injection, another version of the person bursts out of the spine. Elisabeth signs up, and these two versions now co-exist, at once the same and different. The new creation, named Sue (Margaret Qualley, recently of Kinds of Kindness), can hold onto Elisabeth’s dreams of stardom. As with all things that are too good to be true, The Substance has a catch: only one version is awake at a time, and for just seven days. The drug only works if there’s balance, but when presented with youth again, it’s hard to let it go.
As someone who tries to avoid body horror films, The Substance was a bit of a gamble for me. Could I endure it? Well, endure it I did, and far better than those around me. Gasps and groans rippled through the audience throughout the entire film. The woman next to me rarely took her face out of her hands and another, before the film began, hoped it wouldn’t be more graphic than The Banshees of Inisherin. It’s not for the faint of heart, and those with an aversion to needles will have a terrible time. Even with all of its blood, guts, and gore, though, there’s something tender beneath it all. An insecurity that will strike a chord with anyone who has looked in the mirror and wished they could change something about themselves.
Courtesy of TIFF
The Substance blasts onto the screen and holds the audience in a vice grip for its entire two-and-a-half-hour runtime. There’s no doubt that the film is an overload, but in a way that always feels intentional. It’s maximalist, a necessity for a story that addresses the beauty industry, Hollywood, and offers a critique about the way people speak about women as they age. There’s a feeling that a woman’s life or worth or sexual appeal is over when she’s 50. When the film’s bloody crescendo comes, it’s not just Elisabeth and Sue who are covered in blood, it’s everyone. The blood is on all of our hands for our collective treatment of women.
Moore’s performance as Elisabeth is nothing short of extraordinary. It’s career-redefining in a career that is already sprawling. There’s prosthetic work later in the film that Moore revealed required anywhere from six to nine hours in the make-up chair. Even buried under layers of latex, the beating heart of Moore is palpable. The Substance feels like a cathartic release of rage for Moore, someone who has spent decades in the industry and whose looks have been remarked upon for as long as she’s been a household name. Qualley, as Moore’s other half, is electrifying, while Quaid’s Harvey, as confirmed by director Coralie Fargeat, shares more than just a name with Harvey Weinstein.
Long after the film ends, the sounds and the visuals of The Substance will linger. To put it succinctly, it is grotesque. Fargeat shoves her camera in the faces of men who leer, slurp their wine, chew with their mouths open, and believe the world is theirs and theirs alone. Fargeat has created a moviegoing experience that is visceral, overwhelming the senses of the audience. The Substance is everything you’ve heard about it and more. A Faustian blend of The Picture of Dorian Gray and Hollywood glamor, The Substance is a nasty satire of beauty, aging, and the age-old fairytale of success.
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