The grim accusation of men – that they are all the same – may come to mind during this film, along with the piercing defensive hashtag #notallmen. This is an unassuming and schematic but very well-played British folk horror pastiche by screenwriter-director Alex Garland; it feels like a re-designed version of the League of Gentlemen, with overt comic intent, hidden or denied. For me, the film never fully deals with the obvious dramatic consequences of its striking central arrogance: Rory Kinnear’s crazy multi-role casting. But there is undoubtedly something annoying and scandalous about Kinnear’s performances, with wigs and artificial teeth, like a remake of a scary movie on the Dick Emery Show.
The setting is an ideal village in Hertfordshire with a lavishly restored Elizabeth mansion for rent as Airbnb. Harper (played by the reliably excellent Jesse Buckley) is an unhappy young woman overcoming a tragic event in her life in the traditional fashion of movies ranging from Don’t Look Now to Midsomar. Her trauma is related to her partner (Paapa Esiedou), who was anxious, violent and passive-aggressive. Now she has come to this place for rest and treatment.
The landlord is a curious man: Barber and red pants, who seems to deny Harper that she ate one of the apples from the tree in the front garden – and then with a gloomy smile assures her that she is joking. On a walk the next day, Harper sees a naked man in the distance, like a statue of Anthony Gormley, following her home and to be arrested by two police officers when he dials 999. The tax collector doesn’t seem particularly sympathetic when she stops by later for a drink. , as well as the arresting officer who came in to drink alone (in uniform). And when Harper visits the local church for consolation, she is confronted by a fearsome, swearing kid and a thin priest who, after encouraging Harper to talk about his troubles, hints that they are to blame for everything.
“Barber and the Red Pants”… Rory Kinnear in one of the many roles. Photo: Landmark Media / Alamy
All these men are played by Rory Kinnear, distinguished by skills and technique. But the public has a right to ask: why doesn’t Harper notice and comment on the fact that they’re all alike? Is it because, numb with grief, she doesn’t see him? Or are they something like a dream she has, a hallucination with post-traumatic stress caused by the treatment she received from her partner? Are these men the D’Ascoin family with misogyny, every peasant is a symptom of the same patriarchal dysfunction that infects all men, including her partner? Perhaps. Her landlord sadly commented that as a seven-year-old child, his father had told him that he was showing “the character of a failed soldier.”
I think the reality status of the drama could be further refined at the stage of developing the script, and there is a squeak of a bat from not quite deliberate stupidity at the moment when Harper last confronts his partner. Still, the performances are so good and there’s a wonderful scene at the very beginning where Harper tests the echoes of a sinister abandoned railroad tunnel, singing a series of notes in it and hearing them seem to reverberate forever – a musical theme wittily repeated in the soundtrack while the film builds on its bizarre finale.
Men’s screening at the Cannes Film Festival; is released on May 20 in the United States and on June 1 in the United Kingdom.
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