Under The Skin

An Itch You Can't Scratch

By Preston Sinclair

"Do you think I'm pretty?"
      Laura

  

   This may seem like an idiotic question under any other circumstances. Scarlett Johansson's voice purrs in a  gorgeous British accent. There's a certain earnestness to her question which betrays her ignorance of human behavior.
   Jonathon Glazer's film 'Under The Skin' is at once jarring and mesmerizing. It defies expectation. Please check your preconceived notions about film making at the door and most importantly, stop trying to figure it all out.  It's part travel log, part music video, part documentary, part science fiction, part film noire.  Take your pick.
    

  If you like Scottish men with woodies, then you'll like this movie. This movie can't stand much more deconstruction than that.  The guys in this film are like Pavlov's Dog. They salivate when they see Laura. Laura, the alien, doesn't know why the men follow her into the black goo, she just knows that they will.  She's just doing her job. Until she starts to wonder what it would be like to be human, then the whole thing goes sideways.
   Laura has an a-ha moment after she meets a man who is severely disfigured.  She seems as charmed by him as he is by her.  She lures him into the ooze as she has probably done dozens of times before yet somehow she lets this one slip away in order to give him a chance to survive on his own. That chance is short lived due to her cohort's apparent clean up crew sensibility. 
   Laura wanders away in a literal fog. She explores her own humanity by trying to eat cake, which makes her gag.  It's somehow painful to watch her lift the fork to her mouth. At one point she is frozen, as she forces herself to eat something by which she is repulsed..  
   Later, She meets a kind man that she thinks wants to take care of her, but he really wants to have sex with her. During this pivotal scene Laura learns why the men have been following her into the black gooky stuff. It's a private and intense moment yet it lacks passion as the man grimaces as he tries to penetrate her.  Laura pushes him off and grabs the lamp on the night stand and shines it "down there" as she realizes that she is not anatomically correct. It appears that her beauty is in fact only skin deep. 
   She tries to escape the maddening world and for a while and she does find some solace in nature itself. She wanders in a lush forest where she crosses paths with what seems to be a friendly woodsman.  Laura is able to pass as a lone hiker in the woods and she stumbles upon what appears to be a vacant cabin where she tries to curl up and take a nap in a kind of "Goldylocks and The Three Bears" moment.
  

   Just when we begin to root for Laura and hope she makes the break from her motorcycle cronies, the bad woodsman comes in and tries to have his way with her.  What ensues is probably one of the most horrific rape scenes since the classic movie 'Deliverance' with Ned Beatty. In the end the predator becomes the prey.
   This movie will haunt you for days, or even weeks after you watch it, kind of like a rash in a spot you can't quite reach.  Yet when you do reach it, it feels oh so good.

References:

Internet Movie Database