What’s the difference between a cult of celebrity and a plain old cult? Not that much, according to writer-director Mark Anthony Green’s debut film, which casts a reclusive pop star as a cult leader and sends a cub reporter through a terrifying ordeal. It’s a solid premise for a thriller, but this film barely engages with the meat of the question, instead indulging in a series of only mildly creepy scenes before a rush to the finish.
That’s a shame because Green, who has written for GQ, presumably knows the surreal feeling of being a hungry young writer thrust into the surreal world inhabited by megastars and the super-rich: two categories to which this movie’s Alfred Moretti (John Malkovich) decidedly belongs. The reclusive Moretti is bringing out his first new album in 27 years, and a small group of reporters and influencers are invited to a listening party at his remote desert ranch. Ayo Edebiri’s Ariel is among them, to her own surprise, but hopes it will be her big break – if her domineering boss Stan (Murray Bartlett) allows.
The film telegraphs its intentions early and often but never fully establishes its ‘why’: why these people, why this moment. Perhaps coherence isn’t the point. Malkovich, after all, makes an unlikely candidate for the 1990’s biggest pop star, when his stage style seems more early Elton John, so that the audience has to immediately suspend disbelief.
Malkovich makes an unlikely candidate for the ’90’s biggest pop star
Then again, the incongruity may be the point. Moretti’s serene weirdness creates a lovely contrast to Edebiri’s tightly-wound ambition and thinly concealed resentment, and her increasing frustration at her role as the group’s Cassandra. Their scenes together are pretty funny, with Moretti’s big demands and diva stylings running aground on Edebiri’s sly side-eye.
Unfortunately, the thrills are thin on the ground and largely undeveloped. A rush of violence finally delivers some answers in the last act, but the movie – and Ariel – never really get to grips with the tension between loving the art and loving the artist, or the demands that creativity may or may not exact, or the too-high price of ambition. Maybe art does demand something profound of us all, but here the big, interesting ideas have been chipped away in favour of subpar scares, leaving this film’s own cult appeal looking rather limited.
Out worldwide Fri Mar 14.