Possessor (2020)
With David Cronenberg moving away from the body horror genre, his son has picked up the torch. With Antiviral and now, Possessor Brandon Cronenberg shows an eerie affinity for it. This film will have you checking your fingers to make sure they’re still there and feeling your scalp to make sure no holes have appeared. It’s strikingly original, with excellent performances. Particularly effective are the special effects and makeup. Not because they make you wonder how they were done; because of the way they’re utilized.
Tasya Vos (Andrea Riseborough) is a professional assassin working for a high-tech organization. They leave no crime to investigate because the killer is always someone close to the victim; someone whose body Tasya has taken over before committing suicide and returning to her body. Her career has made Tasya increasingly distant from her husband, Michael (Rossif Sutherland), and son, Ira (Gage Graham-Arbuthnot). Her boss, Girder (Jennifer Jason Leigh), doubts her ability to do the job and retain a normal life. Tasya nonetheless accepts a new assignment.
Possessor brings discomfort on so many levels. First, there’s the premise. Killing people for profit is bad enough but it’s the way they're murdered. I don’t mean the brutality of Tasya’s crimes - though their savagery will have you reeling. It’s the idea of taking someone over and then pinning the crime on them. The victim can't even plead innocence in court because each assignment ends with Tasya putting a gun in her mouth. It’s a whole new level of cold, and this is an organization. They have doctors who implant devices into people’s skulls, lab technicians that work the machine Tasya's plugged into, researchers, moles, and more. Do they not see what we see? probably not. Cronenberg (who also wrote the screenplay) brings the camera super close when blood flows, allowing us to see the teeth being knocked out of the place, and the blades penetrate the skin. Still, this has been going on for years.
Little details throughout also make you uneasy. Andrea Riseborough’s look, for instance. The way she moves, her hair, the way she speaks to her victims and family. It’s like she’s not even human anymore. Her latest possession, Colin Tate (Christopher Abbott). His job is the kind of creepy voyeurist grind you imagine happening in real life. Some unscrupulous corporation must be paying people to do what he does… but Cronenberg shows it to you. Even if we close our eyes, the imagines we’ve seen won't go away. I doubt even shards of glass plunged deep into our eye sockets would reach far enough to extract them.
Then, we see these relatively simple but deeply effective visions/dreams. The symbolism is as easy to decipher as 2+2, which makes them even more unsettling. You know more horror is coming but what kind? It leads to a conclusion that's brilliant and chilling. I had to watch it a second time to make sure it happened like I thought it did. I'm almost sorry I double-checked. Now I've got to find a way to shake that feeling. The brilliant originality of Possessor and its stylish direction make you eager to see what is coming next. (April 24, 2021)
