starring Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley, Dennis Quaid
written and directed by Coralie Fargeat
141 minutes
Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore), an aging fitness star and former award winning movie actress signs up for a regimen of treatment, The Substance, that gives her a second chance at youth. She injects herself with The Substance. Her back opens up and a younger version of herself emerges. Sue (Margaret Qualley) quickly becomes a star. Harvey (Dennis Quaid), Elisabeth's agent / manager dumps her and takes on Sue as his latest client. Everything goes great for Sue and Elisabeth (but mostly Sue) until Sue decides to bend the rules.
Elisabeth is the one who suffers, at first. Eventually the suffering spreads to Sue. Elisabeth decides she can't take it anymore. She wants it to end. She almost does end it but then has second thoughts about what she's doing. Sue wakes up and for the first time they are both conscious at the same time. Sue figures out what was going on and goes ballistic.
The movie ends with Sue trying to honor a commitment to host a New Year's Eve celebration. It does not go well.
Thoughts
This movie was about as visually gross as I expected it would be. There's a fair amount of nudity but I didn't find it titillating in the least bit. It often felt plastic. The gross scenes were pretty gross but at times it was so over the top that it made me roll my eyes rather than feel sick to me stomach.
Worth watching? Yes, I think it was worth my time. Once the crazy meter went past 10 it became hard for me to take the story and the characters seriously. Honestly I think it got there faster than I realized it would. I think it was well past ten on the crazy meter before I realized how far it had the potential to go or that it had crossed that line.
I guess that at its heart the film is about what some women will do to hold on to their youth, their looks, and what those things helped them to attain. I think it's also about how a single minded focus can warp an individual.
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