By Before I saw Ari Aster’s final movie, I made a bad decision to slap my friend Bong. midsommarIn this work, a young woman who has tragically lost her parents and sister travels to Scandinavia to attend the village’s midsummer festival, but things take a turn for the worse when it is revealed that the village is a murderous cult. increase.
midsommar It is often hailed as a horror film that takes place entirely in broad daylight. Great description, but what really struck me about this film was the extent to which its setting—the murderous cult—can be interpreted as reflecting the troubled psyche of its protagonist.
This concept is at the heart of Astor’s latest film. bo is scaryIn it, a nervous man and woman, played by Joaquin Phoenix, embark on an unexpectedly long journey to visit their domineering mother, who is both the cause of their existence and the bane of their existence.
Astor has only directed three feature films so far, but each one is more experimental than the last.where genetically A simple but meticulously crafted horror story, bo is scary It is singular enough to defy any classification.
Rather than taking inspiration from other directors, Astor draws inspiration from the writings of Homer, Dante, Kafka, and Borges. The sole filmmaker, he Charlie Kaufman is in some way indebted, but he’s also a compelling psychological horror movie. Synecdoche, New York It permeates nearly every aspect of Astor’s film.
This includes an excellent film that reflects not only the inner lives of the film’s self-destructive protagonists, but their lives in the wider world around them: fear, fear, confusion, disgust, despair, longing. Includes production design and visual effects.
Main characters with clinical depression bo is scary and Synecdoche, New York Both live in a collapsing society. In the former, the rule of law is almost non-existent. Buildings are covered in graffiti, assault rifles are hauled into the streets, and corpses lie face down in gutters.
In both films, this social decline is never addressed, but rather accepted by the characters as normal. It’s the same way we never question what happened in our nightmares, no matter how absurd and disturbing it may seem when we wake up.
According to production designer Fiona Crombie, favorite, walking this fine line between fact and fiction is no easy task. On the one hand, “I want to present a world that is not real,” she says. high times. On the other hand, “It’s not that I don’t want to give it away completely.”
Crombie’s work requires meticulous attention to detail.Everywhere and props bo is scary It serves the purpose of alleviating an audience’s mistrust, enhancing the mood of a scene, or explaining the personality of a particular character.
All of these factors were considered when designing Bo’s apartment. Indecisive and dependent, Beau was unable to transform her home into a comfortable living space. The only personal item there is the blanket on the bed, the same blanket he had as a child.
Bo’s awkward arrangement of furniture matches the counterintuitive layout of his apartment. “The whole thing was meant to be uncomfortable,” Crombie said, pointing to the space between the sofa and coffee table and the annoying cables in the bedroom that Beau had to straddle.
A set designer’s worst enemy is the budget, which, as a rule, is never big enough to cover everything the director asks for.it certainly was bo is scaryis a movie that lasts nearly three hours and spans hundreds of different locations.
One of these locations was a cruise ship, but the team couldn’t find it and didn’t have the budget. Some staff members suggested filming on the train instead, but Astor didn’t listen. Because his scripts are so airtight that, in Crombie’s words, “pull one thread and it all unfolds.”
Bo had to get stuck, and he had to get stuck on the boat. On a ship in the middle of the sea. They ended up using virtual production for this sequence. Crombie didn’t go into detail, but imagines something like the digital environment in which it was filmed. mandalorian.
Crombie said he has no film background and specializes in theater design. This must have been helpful in producing the “Hero Bo” sequence, which she performs in a 12-minute play that imagines Bo living a full and fulfilling life without the influence of her mother. think.
Initially, this stage play sequence was conceived as featuring strictly practical effects, but the hand-painted cardboard clippings seen in performances assembled by schoolchildren and their totalitarian teachers Now includes CGI that mimics and distorts sets at the same time.
Effects artists didn’t start with a blank slate. “The script is exactly what we’ve been doing,” says Jorge Cañada Escolihuela, who directed and produced the sequence. Just as Astor needed to get Bo on a cruise ship, he already had plans for a movie-within-a-movie.
Narratively and thematically, the Hero Bo sequence is at the very heart of the film. As Escolihuela puts it, it represents “the possibilities of his life,” a thought experiment in which a hurt and terrified Beau is temporarily transformed into a hero. Suddenly, his entire world, previously small, expands into the whole world.
When asked how he understood the flow after reading Astor’s script for the first time, Escolihuela showed me a diagram of the entire story he had drawn. He told me not to take a picture of it, but it looked like Dante’s map of the nine circles of Hell, with the hero Beau in the center, the entrance to Purgatory.
In your average horror movie, visual effects and production design are really add-ons. In Astor’s films, these elements of filmmaking are as important as the script and the director. Because it literally helps bring the latter to life.
in contrast, genetically and midsommar, bo is scary has received mixed reviews, leaving many audiences as well as critics perplexed and/or disappointed. Crombie and Escolihuela anticipated this to some degree, as the film was too bold to speak to everyone. “I think you should watch this movie later.” [Aster’s] Career,” concludes Escolihuela. “This will complete his filmography, which is still being built.” bo is scary will undoubtedly mark a turning point in Astor’s career, but it remains to be seen whether its influence will show up in upcoming films.
