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Men (2022 film)
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Wikipedia article
'Men' is a 2022 folk horror film written and directed by Alex Garland. It stars Jessie Buckley as a widowed woman who travels on holiday to a countryside village but becomes disturbed and tormented by the strange men in the village, all portrayed by Rory Kinnear. The film was released in the United States on 20 May 2022, by A24, and in the United Kingdom on 1 June 2022, by Entertainment Film Distributors. It received generally positive reviews for its performances, though its narrative approach received some criticism.
Plot
Following the apparent suicide of her husband James, Harper Marlowe decides to spend a holiday alone in the small village of Cotson. In flashbacks, it is revealed that Harper, fed up with James' emotional abuse and manipulation, intended to divorce him, causing an explosive argument between the two, which eventually leads James to declare that he will die by suicide should Harper ever leave him. Disturbed by James' behavior, Harper leaves the room and quietly attempts to text a friend that she feels unsafe. James suddenly reappears, rips Harper's phone away from her, and reads her text messages. Feeling betrayed that Harper would feel unsafe with him, James becomes violently angry and punches her in the face. James immediately begins to apologize, but Harper angrily locks him out of the flat. She then witnesses him fall from an upstairs balcony to his death. Harper discovers James' body partially impaled on a metal fence outside her flat.
Harper arrives at an old, beautiful country manor house that she is renting. She takes and starts to eat an apple from a tree in the garden then goes to the door and is welcomed by the landlord Geoffrey, an apparently normal, if slightly odd and old-fashioned, country man. He gives her a tour of the house and they have an awkward exchange about Harper's marital status due to the fact that Harper booked her holiday under her married name but is there alone. He gives her a large key for the front door of the house but tells her that people don't tend to lock their doors in the village.
Harper later goes for a walk in the woods and stumbles upon an old disused railway tunnel. Finding that it produces an echo, she experiments using her voice to produce different pitches and tonalities within the tunnel. A figure appears at the distant end of the tunnel and begins screaming and running towards her; in evading it, Harper realizes that she has become lost in the forest. After clambering up a large embankment, Harper escapes the woods, passes by some disused buildings and finds herself in a large, open field at the edge of the forest. She turns back to photograph the abandoned structures with her phone. After taking the photograph, she lowers her phone and immediately sees a bald, naked man staring eerily back at her among the deserted buildings. Harper returns quickly to the manor.
Later that afternoon, during a video call with her friend Riley, Harper sees the naked man through her garden window, his face covered with bloody scratches. He peers through her window and takes an apple from same apple tree from which she ate an apple on arrival at the house. Terrified to realize that the front door is slightly open, Harper quickly shuts and locks it, but the naked man puts his hand through the door's letter box. Harper quickly phones the police and the man is arrested, with one of the arresting officers looking like Geoffrey. A friendly female police officer reassures Harper that the arrested man is probably homeless and looking for food, and may have found shelter in the abandoned buildings at the edge of the woods, where Harper first saw him.
Afterwards, Harper visits a church, where images of the Green Man and Sheela na gig are carved on a font. She cries, remembering James' death. Outside, she meets a mask-wearing young boy and a vicar who both bear a likeness to Geoffrey. The boy insults her when she politely declines his invitation to play hide and seek with him. The vicar sends the boy away. She discusses James' death with the vicar, saying that she feels haunted by it, and that she believes he looked at her during his fall. She wonders if that is possible, since the fall was so quick. The vicar suggests that Harper might be partially to blame for James' death because she didn't allow him to apologize for punching her. Furious with his attitude, she leaves the church and goes to the village pub that Geoffrey recommended on her arrival. There are few patrons in the pub, and they and the bartender all bear Geoffrey's appearance. Geoffrey is also there. He refers to Harper as "Mrs. Marlowe" before addressing her as "Ms." and insists on paying for her drink. His policeman look-alike arrives a short time later. The policeman informs Harper that the naked man has been released in the absence of any legal ground to keep him detained, to her incredulity and chagrin. He is dismissive of her feelings and she leaves the pub. It is now dark outside. The naked man follows her in the background, appearing from behind a tree in the town cemetery.
She contacts Riley about the day's developments, and Riley says that she will drive to the village in the morning so that Harper can continue her holidays at the cottage. As Harper attempts to send Riley the address, her mobile phone's service is repeatedly interrupted. She sees the policeman in her garden and goes outside to ask him why he is there but, as the lights flicker, he disappears. One of the pub's patrons then appears and runs at Harper, who retreats into the house. Harper picks up a knife to defend herself before a window breaks in the kitchen. Geoffrey arrives and finds that the window breakage has been due to a crow, which he then euthanizes by breaking its neck. A chair has also been pulled over or knocked over in the kitchen. As Geoffrey goes into the garden to check for any would-be intruders, he too disappears when lights outside flicker and the naked man is seen when the lights come on again. He starts walking towards Harper and blows ligules of dandelion on her, which put her in a trance. She gets inside the house, and closes the door. When he reaches through the letter box in the front door, and grabs Harper's hand, she stabs him through the arm. He slowly pulls his arm free, the stuck knife ripping his arm in an extreme injury resembling the one James received during his fall. Both the boy and the vicar appear in the house in turn, each of them now similarly injured. Harper asks the vicar what he is, and he replies "A swan" and proceeds to quote some lines of unexplained poetry. Obsessed with thoughts about her sexuality, the vicar attempts to molest Harper, but she stabs him in the stomach and leaves the house.
While attempting to drive away, Harper accidentally runs over Geoffrey and stops the car in a panic. We see that he has the same arm injury as the Green Man, the boy and the vicar. In a rage, he throws Harper out of her car and drives away, circles back around, and chases Harper before crashing the car into a stone wall in front of the house. The naked man, now in full Green Man form, approaches Harper, his ankle now severely broken and matching another injury on James' corpse. The naked man violently gives birth to the young boy, who in turn gives birth to the vicar, then Geoffrey, and finally James, heavily mutilating their bodies. Harper grabs an axe that was seen by the fireplace in an earlier scene. Both James and Harper sit on a sofa inside the house, with him continuing to blame her for his death. When Harper, holding the axe, asks him what he wants from her, James responds that he wants her love. Shortly afterwards, in the morning, Riley arrives at the house and is revealed to be pregnant. Shocked at the blood trail leading into the house, Riley finds Harper sitting in the garden, alive and smiling when she sees her.
Cast
* Jessie Buckley as Harper Marlowe, a woman who goes on holiday after a tragic incident.
* Rory Kinnear as Geoffrey, the owner of the holiday house Harper rents. Kinnear also portrays the numerous "men" in the village that Harper visits (such as the naked man, the vicar, the pub owner, the police officer, Samuel's face and the two pub patrons).
** Zak Rothera-Oxley as the body of Samuel, standing in for Kinnear.
* Paapa Essiedu as James Marlowe, Harper's late husband.
* Gayle Rankin as Riley, Harper's friend who speaks to her primarily over the phone.
* Sarah Twomey as Frieda, a friendly Police Officer.
* Sonoya Mizuno as the voice of the Police Operator.
Production
On 6 January 2021, it was announced that Alex Garland would write and direct a film for A24, his second following 'Ex Machina', with Jessie Buckley and Rory Kinnear in talks to star. Regarding additional casting, 'The Sunday Times' reported Paapa Essiedu rehearsing with Buckley and Kinnear.
Principal photography began on 19 March 2021 and was expected to conclude on 19 May, in the United Kingdom, specifically St Katherine's Docks, London, and parts of Gloucestershire, including Withington, standing in for Cotson; and a tunnel in The Forest of Dean. On 22 May 2021 cinematographer Rob Hardy said filming had wrapped.
Release
'Men' was set to be released in the United States on 20 May 2022 by A24, and was released in the United Kingdom on 1 June by Entertainment Film Distributors. It screened at the Cannes Film Festival in the Directors' Fortnight section in May 2022. It was also selected as opening film at 26th Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival to be screened on 7 July 2022.
Reception
Box office
In the United States and Canada, 'Men' was released alongside 'Downton Abbey: A New Era' in 2,212 theaters. It made $3.3 million in its opening weekend, finishing fifth at the box office. It then earned $1.2 million in its second weekend, finishing ninth, before dropping out of the box office top ten in its third weekend.Critical response
Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "D+" on an A+ to F scale, while PostTrak reported 52% of audience members gave it a positive score, with 30% saying they would definitely recommend it.Mark Kermode of 'The Observer' gave the film 3/5 stars, calling it "a playfully twisted affair not quite as profound as it seems to think, perhaps, but boasting enough squishy metaphorical slime to ensure that its musings upon textbook male characteristics are rarely dull, and sometimes deliciously disgusting." Peter Bradshaw of 'The Guardian' also gave it 3/5 stars, calling it "an unsubtle and schematic but very well-acted Brit folk-horror pastiche". Christy Lemire of 'RogerEbert.com' gave it 3/4 stars, calling it "a visceral experience" and adding: "it reinforces Garland's singular prowess as a craftsman of indelible visuals and gripping mood." David Rooney of 'The Hollywood Reporter' wrote: "Riveting performances from Jessie Buckley and a truly chameleonic Rory Kinnear make this A24 conversation-starter an unconventional genre standout." Peter Travers of ABC News wrote: "With the male need to control women hitting a new flashpoint, Alex Garlands urgent provocation stars the great Jessie Buckley as a widow threatened on all sides by toxic masculinity. Though Garland is stingy with answers, his implications are incendiary."
Kevin Maher of 'The Times' gave it 2/5 stars, writing: "It culminates in a protracted, effects-filled birthing sequence that manages, after 90 minutes of man-hating, to be aggressively misogynistic." Clarisse Loughrey of 'The Independent' also gave it 2/5 stars, writing: "It suggests that all a male filmmaker needs to do to earn his feminist credentials is to show us men doing bad things." K. Austin Collins of 'Rolling Stone' wrote: "Too much is spent reiterating certain gore-ish thrills and slick political points that really dont benefit from the added scrutiny encouraged by repetition; even the grand, ecstatic, pathetic feat of the movies climax fizzles rather than simmers." Armond White of 'National Review' wrote: "Despite its hallucinatory finale, 'Men' is not really an examination of spousal guilt or women's fearful psychology... Plus, it's too absurd to substantiate the media's fascination with 'toxic masculinity.'"
References
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