Women of 'Substance'

For Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley and writer-director Coralie Fargeat, their shocking new film is meant to provoke both thrills and change

- BRIONY SMITH

At the end of a recent press screening of "The Substance," I sat there, my mouth agape. As the lights came up, I remained in my seat, shaken, as my colleagues chatted amiably and filed out of the theatre. I felt like I had just ... witnessed something. A scorching screed against beauty standards, against self-hatred, loud and unabashed. A capital-M Movie. And a capital-M Masterpiece.

I eventually drifted downstairs to the bathroom. I just wanted to be alone, to savour the last few moments of the trance created by writer-director Coralie Fargeat and her brave actors, Demi Moore and Margaret Qualley, both of whom deliver career-best performances of complete and utter fearlessness.

"Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself?" So intones the purveyor of the movie's mysterious titular elixir. Moore plays Elisabeth Sparkle, a Hollywood star who has aged out of her fitness show gig. She's offered a trial run of the Brat-green liquid, a treatment that allows her to split time between her current self and a younger, more nubile version named Sue (Qualley). But managing both forms becomes...difficult. Maximum body horror ensues. This is a movie meant to be seen in the theatre so you can scream along with an audience and have your eyes popped out by the glorious Grand Guignol of it all.

Think you know where the movie might go, how it might end, based on that description? I was completely unprepared for how far Fargeat takes it. When you think she might have pushed it to the limit - the rampant gooey gore, the sheer volume of blood and flesh the film careens ahead, roaring into the red and beyond.