By Cameron Enzor
Los Angeles, CA (The Hollywood Times) 5/28/22 – From A24 & Director Writer Alex Garland, comes a fully fleshed take on Masculinity & Femininity. Profoundly investing itself into a dark cornerstone of humanity, you can’t help but go along for the ominous ride of uncertainty as this tale wants not who you are, but what you are.
MEN’s advertising didn’t do itself proper justice. In seeming to sell itself short through first impression trailers, you walk into an experience that surprisingly pokes the tip of its blade upon your throat. Putting horridly sharp pressure on your jugular, digging it within the external crevices of your neck. Deathly betwixt your adams apple, holding it until the credits die down.
If Ernest Hemingway and Edgar Allen Poe were asked to co-conceive a piece of minimalist art, one that holds statements on humanity’s long troubled balance between masculine and feminine, it would appear nearly as identical and gut-provoking as this. The atmosphere and real-time premise of this harrowing story acts as a well-calculated encryption to truths that don’t bellow underneath the film’s surface, but elevates it all entirely.
The minute I walked into the Cinelounge and sat myself within that intimate & powerful theater, waiting for the projector to begin the piece, I was taken into something completely ambiguous and metaphysical. A guided meditation of which I had little to no control.
Alex Garland shows indeed how horrifically powerful the creation of humanity really is, as well as showing how powerful humanities creations can also be, as this film doesn’t leave you when it leaves the screen. It leaves the theater with you.
Through an artistic lens, every frame of this film is polished with beauty, purpose, and artistic expression. From the vibrant and brooding color pallete, framed composition, & delicate filmmaking, they all fall completely synchronous within one another to create something that’s completely horrifying, but far from a 2Dimensional sense.
Usually, I’ve found a similar issue with a handful of other A24 movies, which is when the film is so intimate and stimulating, I usually walk out after it ends, feeling like the film hasn’t even started yet. Composing such dynamic and fluid narratives really allows an idea and message in and of itself to take a life of its own as you process its elements after the fact.
Sometimes I do wish that these select A24 films would spend as much time embracing their statements and ideas as much as they flesh them out entirely. I guess Cinema needs to accept and promote longer run-times, so A24 can really embrace the film medium of which it’s truly intended for.
Catapulting you into a vast space of conversation, imagination, and perspective, the real magic of this film takes place far after you leave the theater, as you let everything marinate and self-decrypt from beginning to end. A true example of how powerful the film medium can be when a true artist is behind the camera and the page.
MEN is currently playing in select theaters, though I highly encourage you to embrace the intimate experience of seeing it at the Cinelounge on Sunset Boulevard. This is a piece of brilliant cinema that you should not deprive yourself of and to experience it within its entirety.