“Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself? Younger, more beautiful, more perfect. One single injection unlocks your DNA, starting a new cellular division that will release another version of yourself. This is the substance. You are the matrix. Everything comes from you. Everything is you. This is simply a better version of yourself. You just have to share. One week for one, and one week for the other. A perfect balance of seven days each. The one and only thing not to forget: YOU. ARE. ONE.”
If you were to ask what genre of film the Academy is most reluctant to nominate, I would be inclined to say horror movies. Despite the fact that 1991’s “Silence of the Lambs” is one of the few films to have won all five major awards at the Oscars, only five other horror movies had received a Best Picture nomination before this year. Those were also more traditional and accessible horror movies, maximizing the potential for general audience members to actually watch the film. “The Substance” is not that.
As a ‘body horror’ film, “The Substance” is built around the terror of becoming something that few would recognize as “human.” While similar movies such as 1982’s “The Thing” and 1986’s “The Fly” managed to find success with audiences and critics alike, Hollywood has rarely awarded these types of movies outside of an occasional Best Makeup and Hairstyling Oscar. Now, with five Academy Awards nominations, including Best Director and Best Picture, “The Substance” has finally attracted the attention of Hollywood.
The plot follows television celebrity Elizabeth Sparkle (played by the stunning Demi Moore, star of 1990’s “Ghost”), who has led an aerobics show—à la Jane Fonda—for the last 30 years. As the ratings fall over time, Sparkle is fired on her 50th birthday due to her diminished sex appeal.
She becomes involved in a car accident and is sent to the hospital when her young doctor refers her to a secret black market drug with the promise of making her young again. Desperate to cling to her fame, she accepts and crawls through a dilapidated alleyway to collect her dosage, but she gets more than she bargained for.
Upon injecting the substance into herself, she is overwhelmed with pain as a young woman is violently birthed from her spine. This is “Sue” (played by Margaret Qualley, star of 2019’s “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood”), a younger version of Sparkle’s self that contains her consciousness for one-week increments and needs daily stabilizing injections of spinal fluid to keep the balance from being broken. Sue auditions for Elizabeth’s old show and immediately woos the producer Harvey (played by Dennis Quaid). They radically revamped the program to be more animated and arousing.
Sue becomes a star, and Elizabeth begins to feel more undesirable by the day. Sue begins to overstay her allotment of time, draining Elizabeth of her bodily fluids. She continues this until something goes horribly wrong, and bloody hijinks ensue.
Demi Moore delivers an incredibly raw and powerful performance as Elizabeth Sparkle. Her quiet sadness and seething rage manage to give a voice to a whole generation of women who have been cast aside of their age. This is her career best, and after winning the Golden Globe award for Best Leading Actress in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, there is a real chance that she will win the Oscar for Best Actress as well.
The makeup and practical effects seen in the film are nothing short of astonishing. It has been sweeping the entire awards season and deserves its all but guaranteed Oscar.
Coralie Fargaet has created the most unique and daring picture of the year. Even from the film’s opening shot, where a star on the Walk of Fame deteriorates over time and is covered in junk food, her bold vision clearly comes through. This exercise in formalism is among the least subtle films I have ever had the pleasure of viewing, and for that, I love it so much. From the never-ending barrage of shots sexualizing Sue in increasingly outlandish ways to framing a meal of shrimp akin to an eldritch horror, it comes together in such a cohesive manner. If not for Brady Corbet’s work in “The Brutalist,” this film would be the directorial achievement of the year.
My final rating for “The Substance” is a glorious and gory 9/10.