Review: The Lobster

An unusual fable about love as a misguided remedy to solitude, The Lobster is an outstanding master class in pitch-black absurdity. Perhaps not for all tastes, it is nonetheless one of the most original, subversive, provocative, moving, and immensely rewarding films one is likely to see in any year.

Beginning with the assassination of a donkey - an act never referred to again, but one that will make sense as the film goes on - The Lobster quickly introduces viewers to its universe, a dystopia at once familiar and unlike anything seen before. This is a society that prizes marriage above all else to the point where single people are not only shunned, but hunted down and killed. Lest one think this punishment too severe, the society has implemented an institution to give the unattached an opportunity to find a mate within 45 days or be turned into an animal of their choosing and released into the countryside.

Newly detached from his wife, David (Colin Farrell) checks into the Hotel, one such institution, where he answers a preliminary list of questions (including categorising himself as either heterosexual or homosexual; the bisexual option was discarded as it caused too many problems), then strips down to his underwear to join the other new inductees. They are each assigned room numbers; inside their room is a wardrobe filled with a certain number of shirts, pants, dresses, etc. Everyone wears the same outfits as standing out for one's looks or style is not necessarily a factor for being a potentially viable match. Commonality is the main attraction, difference may lead to disaster. As the no-nonsense Hotel manager (Olivia Colman) puts it, "A wolf and a penguin cannot live together...because that would be absurd."

As such, David and the other residents seek out future companions based on their defining characteristics. Limping Man (Ben Whishaw) hopes to find someone with a similar disability, though he is not above faking nosebleeds to capture the interest of Nosebleed Woman (Jessica Barden). What's more painful, Limping Man reasons to David, being killed, being turned into an animal, or banging your nose every now and again to feign a nosebleed? Once coupled, Limping Man and Nosebleed Woman are then moved into the couples section of the Hotel to undergo their month-long trial relationship. The final test is to spend a holiday together. Should any arguments arise, the Hotel can readily assign children, a surefire way of keeping any couple together.

David decides to try Limping Man's method of pretending to be someone you are not to establish a connection and attempts to win over Heartless Woman (Angeliki Papoulia), who has managed to extend the 45-day time limit by over a hundred extra days for her incomparable skill at bagging the loners that reside in the nearby woods during the Hotel's organised hunts. This is a formidably cold-blooded woman, one who displays not one whit of emotion as a resident writhes in pain ("She jumped from the window of 180. There is blood and biscuits everywhere."), and one whose idea of a compatibility test is to pretend to choke to death and see if David will rescue her. Unsurprisingly, their union is brief and brutal.

The second half of the film finds an escaped David falling in love with Short Sighted Woman (Rachel Weisz), one of the numerous wood-dwelling loners led by the disquietingly menacing Loner Leader (Léa Seydoux). These are the single people who have rejected society's rule, but whose lives are governed by an equally strict set of do's and don'ts. Loners may talk to one another, but flirtation is forbidden and kissing results in your lips being slashed. Even here, the individual must submit to the needs of the group. David and Short Sighted Woman carry out their romance in a series of coded gestures, and are soon planning to break away from under the watchful eye of Loner Leader.

Director Yorgos Lanthimos crafts an impeccable satire not only on modern relationships but societal structures. This is a film that Salvador Dalí and Luis Buñuel would have embraced for its deeply surrealistic quality, a work in which the bourgeoisie are put through their paces in the most bizarre ways imaginable, and where comeuppances feel particularly just (a man who professes to love his wife would still shoot her to survive; a woman who forces a man to dig his own grave and cover his face with dirt so his face won't be eaten by dogs wakes up bound and gagged in her own grave with dogs hovering about).

Cinematographer Thimios Bakatakis gifts viewers with compositions that are geometric in their precision, formal in their framing, and unending in their capacity to stun. One is unlikely to forget the opening hunt, rendered in glorious slow-motion, with the characters running awkwardly through the woods, jowls wobbling, hair flopping, limbs flailing - it is a sequence both ridiculous and exquisite.

The cast are exemplary, completely committed to the mercilessly deadpan style required of them. Perversely romantic and brilliantly idiosyncratic, The Lobster is a film that genuinely surprises with each frame and one that forces audiences to question how far they would go to avoid being alone, how much they would sacrifice to conform, and what they are willing to do in order to survive. Replete with poetic ironies, deliciously throwaway gags, and heartbreaking cruelties, this is a masterwork that asks a great deal of faith on the viewer's part but one that is well worth believing in.

The Lobster

Directed by: Yorgos Lanthimos

Written by: Yorgos Lanthimos, Efthymis Filippou

Starring: Colin Farrell, Rachel Weisz, Jessica Barden, Olivia Colman, Ashley Jensen, Ariane Labed, Angeliki Papoulia, John C. Reilly, Léa Seydoux, Ben Whishaw