what will you become?

So this is the story. It looks like being single is a crime. That’s why we have a luxurious hotel where we can find our potential partner. The only catch: You’ll transform into an animal (of your own choosing, at least) if you can’t find one in 45 days. The pressure is on, really. It’s as if the worst and most surreal of reality television are gathered together and taken a notch higher. The Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos’ “The Lobster” thankfully sustains this absurd premise until the end. It made me wish I knew his films prior to this. Collin Farrell is doing a Matthew McConaughey here; after a long absence in a major movie production, Farrell enters the first frame of the film as David with assuredness and the weight of his dilemma. You can see it on the slouch of his shoulder. He even has a beer belly to match the character’s seemingly baffled and expanding state of mind. (Also, this only me excites for his turn in David Yates’ “Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them” come November). And Rachel Weisz, even with the minimal dialogue, is stellar as usual. Although the story’s year is not stated and we can only assume it is happening many years from now, Weisz’s is the character on film that is closest to the thinking that we have right now in 2016, albeit heavily cynic. The film is painful to watch, too. No, it doesn’t have ghosts, screaming teenagers, and grotesque monsters in the form a giant lobster. It doesn’t have any of that trash. Instead, it is unsettling not only because of its dystopian setup but because the conditions of the story almost resemble our present-day relationships: the fleeting emotions, the blurring between love and necessity, the disconnect. In this day and age of dating and hookup apps, the need for mental health care, and now Pokémon Go, “The Lobster” provides us a glimpse of an open window which presents an un-reality that’s bound to happen soon. I guess it’s safe to say let’s start thinking now of our preferred animal transformations.

[ photo borrowed from this site ]