Resurrection - 2022
Updated: Oct 27, 2022
This review may contain spoilers.
It is really interesting to see the fine line that Resurrection walks. There is, after all, a certain version of this film which we’ve seen dozens of times before. Perhaps it goes as far back as Julia Roberts in Sleeping With the Enemy. J Lo’s Enough also comes to mind. The point is, it belongs to an ilk of flicks about imperiled women in manipulative relationships where they are groomed for service, yet somehow find their way through the abuse to fight back. What is unfortunate about what has just been named is their overwhelming salacious, made-for-cable tone. Nary a one of them could be called “great.”
Fortunately, Resurrection also has this OTHER thing going for it. The great critic David Ehlrich compared it to another film which I had the good fortune of viewing recently as well. I’m talking about the high art, toxic relationship disintegrating, body horror wonderwork that is Zulawski’s Possession. Rather than spending its time investing in the cheap thrills of the former group of films, this Andrew Semans work hews much closer to the dual nature of that Polish horror piece from 1981. By this I mean, a film that is doing one thing on the surface but is hiding more extreme, even surreal, elements at the subterranean level. A work, in other words, that portrays trauma by casting internal tension outward into the physical world (a tentacled creature in Possession, a recurring fetus/baby here).
All this to say, the film may be probing at things that are really gritty and could be the kind of scandalous gossip that is regular fodder for water cooler talk, but it is presented in a decidedly artistic fashion. Of course, the centerpiece of this is the absolute tour de force performance of Rebecca Hall. She seems to have upped her lean muscle quotient a touch for this project, and as such, she appears even more tall, gaunt, and sinewy as the events unfold. She’s a woman hiding a secret, a past trauma which leaves her grasping for tight control of her work world, her sex life, and these daily sprints she makes around her home.
But the physical “stuff” is just the start. The individual that begins Act I as a calmly, composed leader who then slowly, with increasing speed and tension unravels into an unrecognizable wreck is undoubtedly a trope of the form. Even so, it’s rarely been done as well as what Hall pulls off here. She is sweaty and overheated. Her posture portrays stress and a recoiling against something. Even her vocal delivery moves from in command to that of an individual losing her grip on her reality and priorities. And ALL THIS does not even begin to note the facial acting she grants the viewer in Semans many well-chosen, long shot close-ups.
I should mention as well that Tim Roth has never been so chilling. He seems like the kind of man who could groom and torture a woman, eroding her very sense of self, all while flashing the biggest sadistic grin.
Of course, how the viewer feels about this whole affair may just come down to the film’s third act. There is certainly a shift here, in tone and in the question of what is “real.” The film, hitherto following a single course alongside Maggie’s rising horror, at last diverges into multiple possibilities. I, for one, adored the bold directorial move. This is the nature of trauma and relational abuse, and what better way to depict the kind of PTSD which arises from these degradations of self than a dip into the surreal. At the end of the hard work put in to crafting such a well-acted, finely honed thriller, the final moments’ fever dream is really the chef’s kiss.
Oh, and WHAT a delicious double billing this would make with Alex Garland’s Men.
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