The French director and her actress, Demi Moore, shook the Cannes Film Festival with “The Substance”, a gory arthouse film against the dictatorship of female beauty.
“Genre cinema is political,” proclaims Coralie Fargeat. She would almost be an activist, a rebel. His film “The Substance” is certainly not to be shown to the faint of heart, as it is overflowing with bloody scenes. But it is also a filmmaker's pamphlet against the macho codes of a society which makes eternal feminine beauty a question of principle. A diktat to which her heroine submits: TV host fired on her 50th birthday, Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore, incredible) discovers this famous substance which will rejuvenate her. To kill her better. “Feeling rejected, not corresponding to what society expects of us, it is these very simple, very powerful lines that have constructed the great literary or philosophical myths,” explains the director. And, for me, genre cinema, in its playful relationship with the spectator, often features those who find themselves on the margins of a degrading system. »
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In the midst of the #MeToo revolution, this is a saving grace. For Coralie Fargeat, thinking that things are starting to change is an illusion. “Issues of violence, power and representation govern the world. We can become aware, denounce, but the rest of the iceberg does not move. The resistance forces are still very powerful, the statistics on the number of attacks and rapes per minute remain terrifying. Given the scale of the disaster, we cannot continue as if nothing had happened. Hence this film in the form of a loud cry. »
Screenplay Prize at Cannes
In the cozy atmosphere of the Cannes Film Festival, “The Substance” did not go unnoticed. Discomfort during the screenings, invective between outraged spectators and those praising a masterpiece. But above all it revealed to the public a filmmaker of great talent. His film, graphic and clinical, would not have displeased Kubrick, Lynch or Cronenberg, obvious sources of inspiration. Coralie Fargeat even manages to pass off her feature film as a Hollywood production shot in the middle of Los Angeles, when it was made with few resources between Cannes and Antibes… Demi Moore was not mistaken. “I really thought she wouldn't be willing to damage her image at all. And, in fact, she gave us very positive feedback on the script. She felt the importance of excess, of nudity. He is someone who thinks outside the box. »
The young woman, a former student at Sciences Po and film school, took her time. A few short films then a notable first film in 2018, “Revenge”, already a gory and feminist manifesto, written before the Weinstein affair. Not without difficulty: “I grew up seeing “Star Wars” and “Indiana Jones”, I felt alive watching these “bigger than life” films. This is why the stories I wrote were not found in the French imagination, I had no place there. » Since her Cannes selection, and the screenplay prize awarded by the Festival jury, she is THE director to follow. “My direction takes shape from the script. The smallest detail, the smallest image, everything is written,” emphasizes Coralie Fargeat. From now on, Hollywood only talks about her and is already thinking about the Oscars. With or without substance…
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