Use of Tropes: The Substance

With numerous Oscar nominations I thought it about time I watched Coralie Fargeat’s 2024 movie The Substance. I went in expecting body horror, I also recognised many influences on the narrative as I watched but I don’t think I was expecting to strongly feel a vampire trope. Now, before we go on, I have to say that whilst I think there is something we might describe as auto-vampirism, I do not think there was any intention to touch into a vampiric element (unless that was the vampirism of the movie and TV industries themselves). However it was such a strong recognition within me that I felt compelled to feature The Substance here.

Elisabeth in the corridor

The film starts with an egg, the yolk is injected and it splits into two – it essentially communicates the main plot and then, to give us the background we need on main character Elisabeth Sparkles (Demi Moore), we see her Walk of Fame star being laid and then see it weather and crack over time. In the present of the film, she is hosting a daytime TV fitness show. The studio has a long corridor with carpet that was not the same as the famous carpet in the Overlook Hotel but I couldn’t help but think had been chosen to bring it to mind. Elisabeth, after filming, needs a restroom but the ladies is out of order and so she goes in the gents. Whilst in a cubicle she hears station executive Harvey (Dennis Quaid) discussing getting a younger replacement for her as he makes his misogynistic ageist views about her apparent. When she later meets him for lunch he is drawn as the greed of the industry personified.

the sale's pitch

Elisabeth ends up in a car crash but, luckily, is uninjured, but the various events have had an emotional toll. Before she leaves the young male nurse (Robin Greer) feels her spine and declares her an ideal candidate. When she has left the hospital, she finds she has been slipped a memory stick labelled with The Substance and a note saying how it changed the writer’s life. I’m not going blow-by-blow as it is the vampiric trope I want to get to. Suffice it to say that she listens to the cryptic message on the stick, ignores it but eventually, driven by the casting advert aiming to replace her, contacts the people behind the Substance. What I found interesting was in no place is finance mentioned, nor are full instructions given (and yet Elisabeth seems to know what to do). Having got her starter package from a back alley building she injects the substance.

eye division

It works pretty quickly and we see her in pain and her pupil divide and become two as her body is twisted, things move below the skin, two eyes sit in a socket and her back splits from which emerges a younger woman – who later names herself Sue (Margaret Qualley). The rules of the Substance are as follows: “You are the matrix. Everything comes from you. Everything is you. This is simply a better version of yourself. You just have to share. One week for one and one week for the other. A perfect balance of seven days each. The one and only thing not to forget: You. Are. One. You can't escape from yourself.” The injection can only be used once and should then be discarded. The other self has to inject stabiliser every day (which is harvested spinal fluid from the original). Whilst one is active for seven days, the other is fed intravenously (food refills are provided by the invisible ones behind this). However, the balance has to be maintained.

the hag's finger

Sue gets Elisabeth’s fitness show slot and is a hit. Elisabeth seems lost within her weeks and Sue wants more than she has (they forget they are one and the same). Sue overruns, due to carnal desire, actively taking an extra dose of spinal fluid. When Elisabeth is switched with her after this (the switch being achieved through tubes that seem to exchange their blood between them) a finger has become old, gnarled and greyed – almost crone or hag like. Literally, if Sue takes time from her, remains her young self-longer, then it greatly ages (parts of) Elisabeth and this was the trope I spotted. Although they are split into two, they are meant to be one and so it is very reminiscent of vampire films such as I Vampiri and Countess Dracula - though she is not getting her youth from the death of others. Indeed, the accelerated aging affecting her normal self as a price for the periods of youth is very much like Countess Dracula. Elisabeth discovers she can stop this and there is a termination solution for the other self but also discovers “What has been used on one side, is lost on the other side. There's no going back.”

Margaret Qualley as Sue

There are obvious things the film draws on. The elements of The Picture of Dorian Gray and perhaps even Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde in the science, though it is youth and fame that is explored as well as the misogynist heart of the fame machine that sees female value in sexualised youth, are very apparent. I had noticed a while back that Kim Newman had made a connection to The Wasp Woman, which does share some broad themes with this and which was one I examined as a potential vampire film (concluding it depended on how broad your definition of the genre is). I loved the look of this film; it wore superficialness as a badge of honour and applied a stylistic gloss, which worked so well given the themes it explores. I had been told some time before that the third act turns heavily into body horror so that was no surprise but there is a blood filled sequence that gives Japanese Splatter-punk a run for its money. Is it a vampire film – in truth no, whilst it plays with the youth stealing trope, she steals from herself (rather than vampirically stealing from others) after all, They. Are. One.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ On Mubi via Amazon US

On Demand @ On Mubi via Amazon UK

Short Film: Where Blood Lies

A ten-minute-long film from 2019 that was directed by Byron Q, this takes us into the Second World War and Romania in 1942.

A group of Nazi soldiers hold villagers and demand to know where the creature is. The man they question claims to not know as he is not from there, he verbally attacks the villagers saying they are not good people but he is a good Christian. He is shot in the head for his trouble.

The Commander (Ben Prendergast) turns his attention to a woman and asks her if she is local and where the creature is, but she doesn’t know. He is about to execute her when a man (David Castro, Immortally Yours) says to stop, he knows where the creature is but warns it has the strength of twenty men – that is exactly why the Nazis are looking for it.

David Castro as the local

When he is leading them, they ask how he knows so much about vampires and he says that a vampire attacked his village, killing his wife. Only he and his ten-years-old daughter survived and she is very ill. I’ll leave it there but you, like I when I watched it, can probably sense where this is going. It is a well shot short, with decent costuming and worth ten-minutes of your day.

The imdb page is here.

Worth Each Penny presents Scary Stories – review

Director: Tatiana Wisniewski (segment)

Release date: 2022

Contains spoilers

Pulled together by Mark Mos, this is one of a group of anthology films released in 2022 based on shorts from various LA film festivals. Each anthology has a host, in this case the clown masked Worth Each Penny (Kristen Lundberg) who, in all fairness, was really annoying but mercifully not on screen for long.

J.C. Henning as Magda

The segment that interests us is a rather short (11-minutes) piece entitled Fresh. It follows philosophy student Emily (Lestonja Diaz), whose grandmother, Magda (J.C. Henning), has passed and she finds a strange set of words and a pendant and, having read them and worn the pendant, starts to not really wish to eat (food that is).

taste blood

She is, however, attracted to the blood that is shed by her friend Lisa (Mika Shepherd) from an accidental cut (that seems to get more than you’d imagine on Emily’s hand) and also hallucinates bathing in blood. She starts to see Magda and the grandmother informs her that she has performed the ritual (whether she intended to or not) and brought on the change by tasting blood. She needs to feed and Emily now has to decide whether she can face the moral dilemma of taking a life in order to live…

bathing in blood

This was a simple little short but it had a great, very brief, blood bathing scene. Unfortunately, I felt it pulled its punch at the denouement and could have been somewhat more explicit. That said, it was solid enough and I liked the idea of accidentally performing a ritual to become a vampire. The score is for the segment only but the film was worth a watch for lovers of shorts/anthologies with a nice collection curated within. 5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Video Shop Tales of Terror – review

Director: Sam Mason-Bell (segment)

Release date: 2023

Contains spoilers

This portmanteau horror film harks back to the days of VHS and has a varied level of success as it explores six tales of terror – I should give a shout out to Clark who told me about the film.

As always with these sort of films, here we are concerned with the vampire segments and in this case there is one – that being the segment entitled The Red Lipped Moon, a segment shot in black and white and which carries a film noir sensibility with primary character (and narrator) Karl (Chris Mills) in the driving seat.

Annabella Rich as Ivy

Karl’s friend Gordon (Ryan Carter) was killed – his pale throat ripped open. Karl determines to find out what happened to Karl, with a clue of a vial of blood. It is disingenuous to think he manages to track down Ivy (Annabella Rich), rather she comes to him with the same offer she had for Gordon – serve her and she will eventually make him immortal…

Chris Mills as Karl

There isn’t a lot more to say. This was a short segment and suffered for it as there were interesting ideas that were not expanded on in a meaningful way. The undercurrent of addiction, for instance, deserved much more exploration. The black and white worked, though a stronger contrast might have been a bonus in some scenes. As always, I am scoring the vampire segment only and 3 out of 10 reflects a segment that could really have been considerably longer.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Drained – review

Directors: Peter Stylianou & Sean Cronin

Release date: 2024

Contains spoilers

This is an indie UK film with some clever ideas and, as you’ll see, for the most part I enjoyed it but, whilst well-played, there was an issue with the characters. Nevertheless it proves itself to be a solid little vampire flick with some interesting lore on offer.

It begins with a decrepit man (Matteo Pasquini) in bed with an intravenous blood bag in his arm. A female vampire, Rhea (Madalina Bellariu Ion, Dampyr), feeds from his wrist. We hear it suggested that they are always and forever.

in the basement

In a room elsewhere, with fantasy drawing on the wall, a man, Thomas (Ruaridh Aldington), furiously masturbates over the art, which he has drawn. He is interrupted by a shout from his mother (Angela Dixon). She tells him that John (Craig Conway), the pest control man, is coming. When John gets there it is clear that his mother is flirting but she asks Thomas to take him to the basement. He does, reluctantly, and then goes out. It is clear Thomas has been reclusive for a while, but he goes to the bar where his friend Dano (Andrew Lyle-Pinnock) works.

first time seeing her

As Dano is working, Thomas is drinking alone. He nips outside for a cigarette and sees a woman enter – Rhea – and is immediately captivated by her, to him she looks like the fantasy girl. He watches her dance and, through the camera lens, it seems to us that her sultry dance is for him. She comes over and says that he is beautiful and asks him to dance. She gives her name and, in a foreign language, says that she can feel his heart. He is overwhelmed by a bloody vision. He wakes the next day, alone at home.

Ruaridh Aldington as Thomas

Two weeks later and he watches Night of the Living Dead, turning the sound up to drown out the sounds of his mother and John having sex. Later, to his shock, he is told that John is moving in and that he is being moved out to John’s flat (that he can’t afford as he is unemployed). He has also not seen anything of Rhea. Buying a (very small) amount of credit for his electric supply he sees a homeless guy (Kenton Lloyd Morgan). The man has, what looks to us like, a pair of fang marks on his wrist and he mentions that *they* bleed us dry. He gets a call from Dano as Rhea is at the bar. He rushes over, speaks to her (but she acts like she doesn’t know him) and then her date (Timothy Blore) comes over. Dano knew she was on a date and called him as a wind up. A drunk Thomas takes a bus home and as he gets to the flat Rhea appears.

feeding

She says she was on the bus, and he didn’t see her (likelihood, she followed in flight as we discover later vampires can fly). She requires inviting in (and interestingly, until it becomes her home, requires an invite each visit). She tells Thomas that the date didn’t taste nice. He fumbles getting the electric on and, when the lights come back on, she is on his bed (she has good night vision, she says). She is apparently going to sleep there and suggests that maybe he is the one. Sleep is actually sleep, not sex, with him below the covers, her over them. He wakes in the night to find her feeding on his arm. Apparently, he is delicious. He does ask her to leave but she leaves her number…

together

So, I’ll leave the blow-by-blow there but it is worth mentioning that, come the first morning Thomas freaks about sunlight until it doesn’t burn him. Later Rhea suggests it irritates, maybe causing eczema. Biting does not turn a person – to become a vampire the person has to eat a vampire’s heart. Her biting does give him pleasure but the wounds start to look like track marks and the drug similes are very evident. However, the film also examines co-dependency and toxic relationships.

when the moon is full

More lore we come across concerns the man from the beginning, Andreas, he is actually her husband – the relationship she has with Thomas is one where he craves the pleasure of the bite and any crumb she’ll give him, it is apparently sexless (she rebuffs an attempted kiss and openly calls him nothing but a victim) – but it appears that she does love “the old man”. Old Man is a good descriptor, when asked what is wrong with him, his nurse says he got old too quick; he is 36. Thomas too becomes rapidly ill and loses weight – this is, of course, a drug use metaphor but may also be draining youth from the victim. There seems to be a mental connection with victims and the full moon turns hunger into a homicidal rage of ravenousness.

keening wail

The film looks lovely and the performances are all solid but the relationship highlights where I found there to be a character issue with the film. Rhea and Thomas become toxic quickly, yes, but the characters (despite best efforts of the actors) are not overly likeable. She is cold and aloof, occasionally cruel – turning on sexuality as a tool (though her keening wail, when Andreas dies, indicates more depths and a mental connection with her drained husband), whilst Thomas is feckless and unmotivated. John should have had his streak of black comedy but unfortunately comes across as dislikable, mum is probably the character with the most viewer sympathy but, all in all, I didn’t warm to any of the main characters. This is not a slight on performance or direction, it was a choice, but I would have liked at least one character to hang a hat on. Overall, however, a well shot vampire flick. 6.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Short Film: Sol

delight

A short film directed by Denise Castro, this was an extra on the Salvación DVD and is so short that this will be an equally short article. It follows a couple going into a cinema. The film they watch has a sunrise in the clouds and as they watch it their faces beam with delight and their fangs show… and that’s it. Not original but it was kind of cute and the look of delight was palpable. At the time of writing I couldn’t find an IMDb page.

Handbook of the Vampire: Carmilla in Context

Written for Handbook of the Vampire by S. Brooke Cameron, the Chapter Page can be found here.

This was another HotV chapter looking at Le Fanu’s Carmilla, this time looking at the original text and specifically around the queer context and the political reading as it pertains to the Irish politics of the time. There is no doubt that the text has a very obvious queer reading but the chapter explores that within its historical context. On the Irish question there is a full discourse on the Protestant/Catholic tensions, the question of home rule and Le Fanu’s own political positioning, which the author suggests was, at best, uncertain.

The author looks comparatively at Carmilla against the other stories within In a Glass Darkly, touching also on Le Fanu’s Spalatro, from the notes of Fra Giacomo and looking briefly at the forward influence on with Dracula. By looking firmly at the nineteenth century the chapter proves an excellent companion to the Carmilla and the Daughters of Darkness chapter.