The Substance has been on my radar for a while. It got a lot of accolades at various film festivals. Demi Moore’s performance was touted as one of the best in her long career. The makeup and special effects were praised for creating a modern body-horror experience. I had somewhat high expectations for The Substance. Wouldn’t you know it? I was not disappointed.

Pros

Makeup effects are impressive
Solid acting from the cast
Very stylized look and direction of the film to make it visually interesting
Lots of eye candy

Cons

Longer movie than it needs to be, and the pacing is slow in spots
Not completely clear on why someone would use the Substance or “sell” it, or how it works

Plot & Thoughts

Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) has had a long, successful career in Hollywood as a popular fitness guru. She was at the top of the world in the 1980s, but like so many other prominent female stars in Tinseltown, time has been cruel, and Sparkle is no longer the desirable starlet she once was. The producer of her fitness show, Harvy (Dennis Quaid), has bluntly expressed how she’s too old to be of much use to him anymore. As Sparkle tries to come to grips with the fact that everyone is looking at her as a has-been, she gets into a car accident and miraculously avoids serious injury. While at the clinic, the nurse slips her a USB drive with a phone number for The Substance on it. She watches the promotional video for it that promises the ability to create a new, “better” version of herself so long as she follows the strict rules of The Substance and continues to believe that she and her new version “are one.” While the methods of contact and retrieval of The Substance seem pretty shady and are likely not legal, Sparkle goes through with it, and what happens next changes everything.

I won’t spoil what happens in The Substance or what the Substance actually does, as I think a fair amount of this movie’s charm is somewhat hinged on not knowing exactly what is going on. There are some mysteries raised about how it all works, who is responsible for producing the Substance, how many potential users of it there are in the world, etc. None of these questions are really answered. This is mostly a good thing because the mystery adds to the world and makes things interesting. Still, without a real explanation, I didn’t fully understand the nature of what the Substance actually did, how a person’s consciousness worked with its involvement, what the real benefits were, and so forth.

Despite it being the name of the film, The Substance is not really about a mysterious liquid. It wears its themes on its sleeves as a satirically extreme take on the entertainment industry and how it treats women within that space. Women can be superstars with their own star on the walk of fame, but every woman has an expiration date, ready to be replaced by the next hot, young thing at a moment’s notice. The older women who helped build an industry are treated in the past tense and cast aside to make room for their replacements, driving them to desperate means of trying to stay young in a vapid world focused on looks. Meanwhile, the young new stars are ignorant of the paths that were forged by their older torchbearers, even occasionally taking something from them to elevate their own new careers within the cyclical corporate machine. And this all happens while the industry gets richer and the sleazy producers get to make more money and lech after the hot, young stars.

There are moments throughout the story that I couldn’t help but root for Elisabeth to find the strength to leave the Substance behind and acknowledge her beauty in her age, particularly when she has the opportunity to go out on a date in the middle of the movie. Part of my sympathy comes from knowing the harsh reality that Hollywood treats its female stars this way. The other part comes from the great acting on the part of Demi Moore. She doesn’t necessarily have a lot of lines, as this is not a dialogue-heavy movie, but you get a great understanding of what is going through Elisabeth’s mind from all of her facial expressions and emoting. Likewise, Dennis Quaid puts in a great sleazeball performance as the producer who happens to have the most infamous first name in Hollywood these days. He’s definitely more of a caricature than a real character, but I think it lends to the movie’s style.

When everything starts to hit the fan and The Substance goes full body horror, it all looks very impressive. The whole movie has a look to it that oozes a gross style, using fisheye lenses, high-contrast colors, and extreme close-ups to tie into the satirical themes of the story. Meanwhile, the makeup and practical effects are top-notch. Though many of the scenes involving the effects are dreams, they still manage to create an unsettling image, like a foreign object suddenly protruding from within a person’s leg to then be extracted from their stomach with bare hands. The transformation that Elisabeth goes through makes her nearly unrecognizable by the end. The final reveal is visually impressive in how it manages to be a gross but convincing special effect that is not commonly seen these days, with most of that type of thing being done on a computer instead of practically.

When I look back on my experience watching The Substance, I’ll admit I was not necessarily engrossed in it at first. I was intrigued by the weirdness of everything. I was drawn in by the style and how the movie looked. I was sympathetic to Elisabeth Sparkle’s all-too-common story. My attention was certainly captivated by the excessive amount of T&A. Still, I felt that the pacing was a bit slow in spots, and the movie didn’t need to be over two hours long. It wasn’t until I sat and reflected on the movie as a whole that I realized how much I enjoyed it. It’s one of those movies in which there’s a lot going on, and it may not hit you until later how much fun you had watching it.

TL;DR

The Substance is a slick, stylized body-horror movie that tells a sympathetic tale about an older woman desperately trying to stay relevant in a cruel and unforgiving Hollywood. It has some great performances and awesome special effects. There’s enough going on to keep you engaged but not overwhelmed by all the weirdness of everything that happens. Though it could have been a little shorter, I was still thoroughly entertained.

Dagon Dogs Posts