Men

Movie Name: Men
Year of Release: 2022
Director: Alex Garland
Starring: Jessie Buckley, Rory Kinnear, Paapa Essiedu, Gayle Rankin, Sarah Twomey, Zak Rothera-Oxley
Genre: Drama, Horror
Score out of ten (whole numbers only): 6
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Synopsis and Review

Following the fantastic double punch of "Ex-Machina" and "Annihilation", "Men" is writer/director Alex Garland's third feature. It focuses its narrative on the character of Harper Marlowe, who following the apparent suicide of her husband James, decides to spend some time on her own, away from the frantic pacing of the big city, in a small village by the name of Cotson. Once she arrives in the country house she is renting, the owner of the property/house is there to greet her and give her a tour of the house. Harper decides to go for a walk in the nearby woods. As much as the walk is therapeutic, she reaches a disused tunnel, where she notices there's a human figure on the other side of it, that suddenly starts running towards her. She runs until she eventually finds herself in an open field. When she decides to take a photo of the landscape, she notices a naked man standing in the distance. The same man appears in the garden of the property where she's staying, with his face covered with bloody scratches. He seemingly tries to get in, and Harper calls the police. Once the police takes the man away, Harper visits the local church, where she has uncomfortable interactions with a young boy and the Vicar, both of whom look a bit like Geoffrey, the owner of the house where she's staying. Harper calls her friend Riley, who volunteers to come and stay with her, however before she can do so, things get even stranger for Harper. 

"Ex-Machina" and "Annihilation" were on the surface interesting reflections on topics such as artificial intelligence and alien presences (on Earth), which eventually paved the way for a deeper consideration on what it means to be human, particularly all that comes with it, be it insecurities, fears, but also the ability to love and establish deep emotional connections. "Men", which immediately positions the situation in which the lead character finds herself in, as a justifiably traumatic one, since her husband (possibly emotionally and physically abusive) has a particularly horrific death, is much heavier on symbolism than the previous films tackled by Alex Garland. And this symbolism, as intelligently represented as it may be, and the latitude of interpretations that it opens, it sadly feels almost a bit too cryptic to either come across as a disturbing view of male violence and oppression towards women, or even a tale of folklore horror. And while the atmosphere the director creates is indeed a disturbing one (it almost feels like eerily reminiscent of Chris Cunningham's music videos for Aphex Twin in the 1990s), the gimmick also limits the character dimension that is presented and empathy that we create with what's taking place. Harper, who is indeed our guiding presence in this narrative, mostly comes across as someone who was indeed a victim who tried to remove herself from a bad situation, but that's mostly what we get from that character. And maybe this enigma is deliberate, and plays to the overall conceptual aspect of the film, but doesn't necessarily make it that much more compelling or even, humane. The supporting characters, almost all of them played by Rory Kinnear, are also cardboard cutouts or simple archetypes, even when the polarizing ending starts to present itself. It's a film that feels a bit lost in itself, that is trying to make a lot of points, but whose language isn't necessarily one that everyone will comprehend. And while there's nothing wrong with that, Alex Garland, unlike say David Lynch whose surreal storytelling takes viewers on unexpected journeys, keeps his artistic point of view very close to his own chest, and fails to invite us all in. The atmosphere, the cast and the production team are all superb, but this is ultimately a film that does not feel as well resolved as the prior ones from this writer/director.