'The Substance' is about how gruesome and shocking the endless pursuit of vanity can be

Beauty is pain. Pain is beauty. Remember you are one.

The Substance is easily the best film I've seen all year.

The movie stars Demi Moore as Elizabeth Sparkle, the star of a popular TV exercise show, who is fired on the day of her 50th birthday. On her way home, she gets into a car accident. While at the hospital, she is given a flash drive by a nurse labeled “The Substance.” Upon arriving home, Elizabeth examines the flash drive's contents. She learns that “The Substance” is an injectable serum with unusual effects developed and provided by a mysterious manufacturer. When used, it creates a younger, more attractive version of the person. This new version remains connected to the original. Although hesitant at first, Elizabeth ultimately decides to order and use the product, unable to come to terms with her firing and self-image.

The Substance turns out to be a green-fluid serum with a skincare-like routine cranked up to eleven: Step one involves Elizabeth injecting herself with the “Activator” (warned to use it only once), resulting in a “new” Elizabeth bursting out from her spine, who later dubs herself “Sue.” The two don't share a consciousness but are still somehow connected as one. Step two is while Elizabeth enters into an unconscious state, Sue must hook her up to liquid IV food for seven straight days. For step three, Sue must inject herself with “Stabilizer” serum each day, which is extracted from the unconscious Elizabeth's spine. Finally, at the end of the seven days, Sue must “switch” with Elizabeth—without exception—and Elizabeth must repeat the process.

The benefits of having the younger Sue out in the world are immediate: Sue is able to get Elizabeth's old show back and is very quickly made a star with an even greater level of admiration and fame. Elizabeth gets to keep feeling useful like she matters. Unfortunately, problems arise just as quickly. Although she's become relevant and pretty again, Elizabeth still suffers from loneliness and self-esteem issues. 

Early in the film, there is a scene in which Elizabeth meets an adoring fan of both her and her old TV show. The fan so far is the only person (and will remain the only person) in Elizabeth's life who continues to admire her beauty despite the passage of time — going so far as to awkwardly ask Elizabeth out on a date, giving her his phone number. You can't help but feel sad for Elizabeth at this point. You can clearly tell that the approval she's receiving from this guy feels good. It feels genuine. Elizabeth, for one brief instance, doesn't feel like some hulking ugly mutant monster with a pair of tits. She stuffs away his phone number and forgets about it until later, ultimately succumbing to the darkness of her insecurity by ordering the wonder drug offered to her later.

One week, as Sue continues on with her “own” life, she decides she needs more time than the day-long Stabilizer fluid grants her, extracting more from Elizabeth to get it. The consequence of disobeying the seven-day switch requirement is gruesome: it causes Elizabeth to age rapidly. At first, this is isolated to only Elizabeth's finger, which is enough to frighten her into reconsidering using the Substance. When Elizabeth contacts the supplier, she's given a choice: respect the seven-day switching requirement or terminate the use of the Substance altogether. Unfortunately for Elizabeth, the damage to her finger is irreversible.

Elizabeth is given a chance. In fact, she's given multiple chances. The film doesn't take the easy way out of painting the supplier of this freaky drug as the sole bad actor. Elizabeth is presented with multiple opportunities to back out of using the Substance. After seeing firsthand (or rather, first finger) the potential consequences if she misuses the serum, she decides to put a pause on the whole ordeal. It's a critical hour of self-reflection for Elizabeth. Is she willing to take such a massive risk in exchange for admiration? 

In a fit of anger, tossing items around her home, Elizabeth ends up rediscovering the phone number of the adoring fan from earlier. She recalls how good his guy made her feel and decides to call and take him up on his date offer. There's a glimmer of hope in this scene. Maybe Elizabeth will go on this date and get her confidence back. Will she realize that she doesn't need to have the praise of the entire world to feel validated? You're rooting for her and excited to see what she'll take from the whole experience.

On the night of the date, Elizabeth is getting ready in front of her bathroom mirror; putting on the final touches on her makeup. As she’s about to leave, she pauses, and decides to go back into the bathroom and continue fussing over her appearance. Applying and reapplying makeup. Putting on more and less clothes, over and over. Obsessing over the lines on her face, growing furious over every single imperfection. At the end of it all, Elizabeth continues to wallow in her depression, staying inside and sulking. Abandoning her date plans and deciding to unpause the serum usage. 

For Elizabeth, it's not enough for one person to love her. She's become addicted to everyone loving her.

Sue, meanwhile, grows tired of having to switch back and forth with Elizabeth. Seeing her as a nuisance that's holding her back. While Elizabeth plunges further and further into depression — resulting in overeating and heavy drinking — Sue becomes addicted to extracting more and more Stabilizer fluid from Elizabeth to buy herself more time before having to switch. I don't want to give away too much more about this movie than I already have, but the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde meets the The Picture of Dorian Gray dynamic between Elizabeth and Sue becomes incredibly disturbing as the film goes on, and it doesn't go anywhere good for either of the two.

I'll get this part out of the way right now. This movie is visceral. This is a body horror movie through and through on par with many classic David Cronenberg films. There is quite a bit of blood, gore, and body mutilation. People who have a natural aversion to stuff like that might want to stay away. That being said, nothing in The Substance made me want to hurl up my popcorn and Coke Zero. In reading a lot of the early reactions to this movie in the lead-up to watching it, I was getting the impression that there would be a lot of gross-out moments. I was seeing reports of people walking out and people throwing up immediately upon exiting the theater.

Honestly? I've seen worse. Anyone who grew up like me, with unsupervised access to the internet (or even played most horror video games), very likely has witnessed a lot more stomach-churning stuff than what is in this movie. I don't exactly know what that says about me, and I'm not trying to wear that as some weird badge of honor the way 99% of the internet loves to do these days, but I bring it up to give some sort of a baseline here. I still cringe at things like needles piercing skin and some body mutilation stuff, which this film has a lot of, but nothing that would make me want to get up and leave.

The only parts that came close to making me want to gag a bit were the small moments here and there of close-up shots of food and people eating. Nothing will make you a firm believer in the fact that people should chew with their mouths closed than The Substance. Words can’t capture just how intense the movie will get. Looking up screengrabs online won’t do you any good as the worst you’ll find is the one above this paragraph; and with good reason.

Beyond all that, The Substance is a truly awesome film. The body horror contained within is used with great effect to tell a deeper story about aging, beauty standards, fame, and self-worth. The Substance depicts the lengths that humans will go to to try and extract just a few more hits at the fountain of youth to continue looking young and hot as long as possible. How society will discard and forget about you once you reach a certain age and are no longer “useful”. Realizing how many people will begin treating you with hostility and cruelty for the crime of simply getting older and developing some wrinkles. The Substance is about how all these things take a toll on someone and how we allow both our own and society's vanity to override our confidence.

Demi Moore gives an incredible performance as Elizabeth. Her slow decay into mental and physical deterioration through continued use of the Substance was portrayed phenomenally by Moore. She should win an award for her acting in this. I agree with what many are saying that this is potentially the best performance Moore has ever given. Moore constantly teeters between mental insanity and a woman trying so hard not to hate herself. Dennis Quaid as her slimy, gross, misogynistic pig boss, Harvey, was also great. Quaid, in his zaniness, really captures just how awful and disgusting of a man Harvey is both towards Elizabeth, his staff at the TV network, and in general. Even when playing such a pig of a man, Quaid has charisma. 

Sue is portrayed by Margaret Qualley (whom nerds like me might recognize from the 2019 video game, Death Stranding). Qualley's performance as the hotter, sexy doppelganger of Elizabeth is great, showing just how shallow Hollywood can be and how anatomical symmetry is a currency in that industry. She's meant to be attractive, easy on the eyes, and admired, and in doing so, you feel complicit in the very thing this movie is screeching at you not to do. Qualley's character isn't spared from the gruesomeness or rage that Moore's character is subjected to, and she brings a stellar display to those scenes as well.

The cinematography in The Substance was wonderful. The film has several overhead and close-up shots that drive home the discomfort of the movie. Especially when the movie focuses on people chewing and eating, you get plenty of close-up shots of asses and people making out, but on the other end of the spectrum, you'll be treated to plenty of cringe-inducing body evisceration. There are plenty of wide shots that can be stylistic or disorientating. The film's soundtrack is also noteworthy—loud, bombastic, and electrifying—it had me looking up the credits afterward to find track and artist names. The special makeup effects were on an insane level. That alone should qualify the movie for some kind of award, if nothing else. 

I had a fucking amazing time watching The Substance. This is a raw-as-hell film in both the literary and Gen Z senses of the word. Coralie Fargeat is making no attempts to be subtle here. Some may balk at the almost two-and-a-half-hour runtime, but I was so engaged and locked in that the time just flew on by. Between all the body horror and gross shots of people eating, there is a gripping story and characters. The Substance even manages to be hilarious in the exaggerated and excessiveness of Fargeat’s movie, especially in the final act. While I can definitely see the perspective that this act was a little too over the top and unnecessarily bloody, I still think it worked. I was not complaining at all.

In a sequence that was clearly made for theaters, the final 30 minutes is a great collective experience to have with others. I was hooting and hollering the entire time. Movies are back, baby, and sickos like me are feasting. The exaggerated cinematography and acting work incredibly well in Fargeat's film that wouldn't have held up in anyone else's hands. Every single time I thought the film was done with me, the movie just kept on upping the ante over and over. The Substance is weird, funny, emotional, thrilling, creepy, and gratuitous.

And thus far, my favorite movie of the year.