Under The Skin, an occult film? (SPOILERS)

[Talulah, really!]

Couldn't see a thread for this.[nb]Nor Her neither, got something against Scarlett Johannson?[/nb]

Spoilers from the get go.

Anyway this will be a bit batshit insane to most and based on one viewing so apologies if it goes a little astray but maybe there will be one or two this rather errant reading might appeal to...so, here goes.

Under The Skin is an occult film, it is a symbolic drama about the castration complex told in alchemic terms alluding to Grail mythology.

It isn't a science fiction film[nb]The book certainly is but the film owes very little to it beyond the conceit of an unearthly being is lose in Scotland and picking up men who come to a sticky end[nb]Obligatory, they'll all come to a sticky end by the time...[/nb][/nb], there are no spaceships, ray guns or advance technology. The non-human beings we see are just as well understood in terms of the supernatural, uncanny doppelgangers, changelings, creatures from another realm, operating occult rituals.

The film charts a course of transformation and the latter half of the film, that is after the encountered with the disfigured man, acts as a mirror image and reversal of the forces and images in the first.

So at the beginning we see a version of a castration fantasy, a beautiful woman beguiles a series of men to their doom through the promise of sex. She takes them into a dark cavern of unworldly dimensions and properties, a place that appears to be not of this earth, the men act as though in a ritual in comparison to the naturalistic way they are portrayed prior to being here with their "awright doll" galluswegian patter, we watch as they are slowly swallowed up as the floor magically turns into black pitch.

Notice in the first part of the film she speaks, she is a siren, her cut glass English tones contrasting with the earthy Scots she encounters, she loses this power in the second half of the film.

The scene on the beach plays out as a foretaste of what is in store for her, it is her journey in miniature. The tragedy begins when the wife goes into the water to rescue the dog, in our terms a "lower animal", the husband follows and finally the swimmer, the deaths are brought upon by empathy, something she doesn't demonstrate at this point.

Incidentally, the shot of the dog struggling brought to mind Goya's Dog painting.



The change point of the film occurs after the encounter with the disfigured man. The dialogue makes it pretty clear that the man is a virgin, he is a holy innocent, untouched by sin which is why her magic ritual fails and her power is lost, it is also because she sins by demonstrating sympathy for him, she allows him to touch her, to make contact and connect, from now to end the end of the film despite her struggling she is in the sea of the human world and she will drown as surely as the people in the beach scene.

She has lost the power of speech and her purpose, she has fallen out of her world and into ours, roles are reversed and rituals too. Previously she was in charge of the vehicle, she lured men in took them to her cavern and consumed him, now we watch the same happen to her, the man at the bus stop invites her upon the bus, she follows him now to his place and in the scene at the castle he reverses her ritual by first carrying her over the boggy earth and water, where her place is one of dark chambers, here is a ruined castle exposed to the air and light and the scene closes with her being lead down the stone stairwell (she always lead the men upstairs.

She is finally killed in the great outdoors of the forest (by a rapist ejaculating petrol all over her -sheesh, stop being so precious about your castration fears!) and consumed by fire as she stands exposed, the precious gold of tantalising female beauty stripped bare to reveal the base lead of the creature beneath. The final shot is of an alchemic transformation of the elements, the fire rising to the sky in black smoke and ashes, turning in the air to water to fall as snow upon the earth, the changeling cleansed.

Through the film there are all sorts of corresponding binaries, parallels and symbols (black/white light, the use of voices for example).

Probably a bit pretentious and rambling but.[nb]That is yer actual Glaswegian there.[/nb]

[small_world]

Yeah, there's a thread for this.

I haven't seen it yet, but looking forward to it.
This'll hopefully get pulled across in to the other thread.
(hopefully without my inane comment)

[El Unicornio, mang]

other thread: http://www.cookdandbombd.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,37942.0.html

Good write-up, although I'd say it's still a science fiction film. Sci-fi doesn't need to incorporate futuristic technology or space stuff, it just needs to be fiction which goes beyond our own scientific reality (The Twilight Zone, for example).

[popcorn]

You didn't look very hard for the other thread.

Very interesting analysis though. It hadn't occurred to me that the deaths on the beach all come from empathy, and mirror the sinking imagery in the seduction bits, somehow I'd missed that entirely.

It occurred to me the other day that the first half of the film is all urban and the second half is natural/woodland/ancient buildings. She ditches the van, too. That seems to equate the urban stuff with another kind of artificial skin she sheds. There's obvious womb imagery with the shot of her sleeping in the cabin fading into the shot of the dense woodland, too.

One thing I can't quite make sense of is the bikers going after her in the last act of the film. It raises tension, but it goes absolutely nowhere. I was expecting them to "save" her from the rapist by killing him, and then probably kill her too. It feels like if they found her remains it would close the idea, but they don't even do that. It's not necessarily about missing a satisfying plot closure - it's more that I can't figure out what effect it creates by not doing that. What does it mean to have them set out to chase her in the first place, symbolically?

[Steven]

Haven't seen this yet but like when films try and get some subtle allegories attempted to be put across in them. Will give it a viewing. Well done for spotting the link between grail mythology and castration, in one of the grail stories, can't remember if it's in De Troyes or Von Eschenbach, I think Gawain stops off at a castle and a parade of grail maidens form a procession from a room carrying a blood tipped spear and a bowl of blood. The inference is they had just performed a secret circumcision ceremony, the grail stories are full of references to these types of alchemical pre-Rosicrucian musings. This type of ceremony was done in some secret societies so that the members couldn't be manipulated through sex, but I'm sure as more likely a form of proving your commitment to the group. When you see these exposēs on stuff like the Skull and Bones society they mention the initiation ceremony involves tying a red bow round the penis, this is the symbolic castration that was previously physically done in the past.

[envelope]

Wasn't sure whether to reply to this one or the other thread but, fuck it, tossed a coin and this won.

Great analysis and I like the idea. Can't believe I didn't spot the parallel of the

Spoiler alert

woman/man/dog drowing with the submergence in the black goo

[close]

I definitely got an occult/pagan vibe during the last third, and there were some obvious shots that referenced becoming one with nature etc.

However, two things that really signpost this as the main character being extraterrestrial for me

Spoiler alert

The phonetics being practiced during the opening sequence. I loved this. My interpretation straight away was of someone learning a martian language.

Also, I'm so sure that there were some flashy UFO-style lights above the building at the very start. Obscured by clouds and quite subtle but I'm sure I saw it.

[close]

It felt too like the clothing of the creepy motor cyclists was deliberately skewed towards a futuristic space suit look. Looked a bit tron at one point.

Oh yeah, the bit when

Spoiler alert

creepy motorbike dude was circling Johannson. I took this to be a kind of familiarisation/examination. Him getting used to how she looks and making sure he memorised her, or perhaps looking for flaws that'd give away her identity.

My girlfriend though was sure that this was some sort of communication between the two. Him downloading info.

[close]

Loved this film so much. Cock's n all!

[Steven]

The inference is they had just performed a secret circumcision ceremony, the grail stories are full of references to these types of alchemical pre-Rosicrucian musings.

Oops, I of course meant a secret CASTRATION ceremony, it was late and I was trying to be brief, or cut it short as it were. Had a quick google and this book touches on this raw and sensitive area, specifically the Eunuchs Of The Grail section. I once wrote a University Paper on the hidden meanings in the Grail Romances, but basically the gist was to put across and share these controversial philosophical ideas that became more prevalent under groups like the Rosicrucians, with the Grail being similar to the alchemical Philosopher's Stone. Sort of bridging the gap between the Old World Pagan magick and the Enlightenment.

As with alchemical manuscripts a certain code had to be used to evade understanding by the wrong people, such as the Catholic church etc, in the same way artists had to use symbolism to put across their ideas, obviously as a lot of their patrons were from the Church and asked for Biblical scenes it was very punk to hide stuff right under their noses. I see there are a few books on this subject matter now. Though since the Da Vinci Code there has been explosion in trashy pulp esotericism books that purport to have any decent research or conclusions in these kind of areas but are generally terrible, it's more difficult to choose what to read these days!

[Nobody Soup]

It occurred to me the other day that the first half of the film is all urban and the second half is natural/woodland/ancient buildings. She ditches the van, too. That seems to equate the urban stuff with another kind of artificial skin she sheds. There's obvious womb imagery with the shot of her sleeping in the cabin fading into the shot of the dense woodland, too.

this struck me very much while watching it, (perhaps being from glasgow helped as the first half was mostly locations I know quite well so when it transported to the more anonymous, desolate countryside it certainly felt like the film was going somewhere different, add to that glasgow was very much used as a character itself in the opening half with locals being used in a naturalistic manner so there was an escape from that character.)

I'd struggle to put out in detail metaphors in particular scens but the overall impression I felt I was left with was along the lines of the "robot learns to love" story you mentioned in the other thread but in this case it was about the alien learning about loneliness and empathising with that. sex played the part of this spectral force bring people together, but not for better or for worse, just as a tension that bubbles beneath the surface of human interaction. it's portrayed both as motivator for kindness and as a motivator for extreme violence.

I thought it was haunting and vicious and staggergingly beautiful.

[Talulah, really!]

You didn't look very hard for the other thread.

Just another failed attempt at humour on my part, alluding to the recent spate of duplicate film threads. Just didn't want to bury my post in a huge black Spoiler box in the other thread.

It occurred to me the other day that the first half of the film is all urban and the second half is natural/woodland/ancient buildings.

Absolutely, it's another of the reversals/binaries of the first and second half of the film. Also my impression is that there is a difference in the predominant point of view of the camera and the use of wide angles and close ups. In the first half, the urban locations, the camera is frequently either shooting from the point of view of Scarlett Johansson, as she drives around Glasgow we see what she sees, what she is looking at or it is shot, from just over her shoulder as it were, she is in close focus most of the time, she is narrating the film as it were, the camera is up close and personal. In the latter half of the film, she is shot more often from middle distance or long shot, framed in the scene, the camera's point of view has switched to that of the omniscient narrator watching from a distance, observing the character from the outside. It isn't exclusively that way (for instance, the pulling out after she falls in the street or the close up of the chocolate cake in the cafe) but it definitely felt different to me and seemed deliberate.

One thing I can't quite make sense of is the bikers going after her in the last act of the film. It raises tension, but it goes absolutely nowhere. I was expecting them to "save" her from the rapist by killing him, and then probably kill her too. It feels like if they found her remains it would close the idea, but they don't even do that. It's not necessarily about missing a satisfying plot closure - it's more that I can't figure out what effect it creates by not doing that. What does it mean to have them set out to chase her in the first place, symbolically?

Going back to my occult reading, after her encounter with the Holy Innocent she loses contact with the bikers, she has lost her powers, she is no longer one of them. In the early part of the film they seem to communicate wordlessly or intuitively to each other (telepathy if you like) and know where to find each other, in the latter half, the bikers are searching for her but seem to have lost her scent setting out in aimless pursuit. Notice it happens after she gets lost in a cleansing bank of dense white fog which is when she abandons the van. The fog also a visually symbolic foretaste of the white snowdrift at the end.

I definitely got an occult/pagan vibe during the last third, and there were some obvious shots that referenced becoming one with nature etc.

However, two things that really signpost this as the main character being extraterrestrial for me

The phonetics being practiced during the opening sequence. I loved this. My interpretation straight away was of someone learning a martian language.

Also, I'm so sure that there were some flashy UFO-style lights above the building at the very start. Obscured by clouds and quite subtle but I'm sure I saw it.

You did! However it was subtle and can of course be taken as ambiguous, as you only see some odd coloured lights in the sky which are equally capable of being taken as symbolising a portal between other dimensions, a trope seen in all sorts of fantasy film and TV.

The opening sequence is certainly the strongest nudge to the viewer to see this as Science Fiction proper in that it both was visually reminiscent of 2001 and that the phonetics were somewhat computer voiced and glitchy though it might be possible to argue what we are hearing is an unearthly incantation, a transference spell, the ritual chanting of a sigil.

Of course it is possible to read the film in almost purely Science Fiction terms in numerous ways, for instance as an example of J.G.Ballard examination of inner space, she is an exploratory astronaut travelling in her space vehicle exploring the planet, performing anatomy experiments, learning about the species but also travelling inwards in the way that the heroes of Ballard's novels do even to the point of their own destruction as she slowly finds the desires and needs of her unconscious reaching out and being reflected in the bizarre world she finds herself in but it seemed interesting to open it up a little to the reading of it as an occult film.

[envelope]

Absolutely love your interpretation and it's a mark of the film's excellence that what you're saying makes sense too. Open to multiple interpretations ,yet a totally focused bit of film making.

After walking out of the cinema I thought it'd be a long time before I could hack seeing it again, but desperate to give it another run through now.

The opening scene is definite sci-fi for me. Likewise the captured blokes preserved in marmite jelly felt more alien than supernatural. I can remember a couple of strange abstract bits of imagery during that bit, had no idea what I was looking at. Exactly how you'd probably feel when staring at an alien object. Very much how johannson's character must have felt at times.

Liked the shift towards a more earthy tone as the movie went on. Found the ending devastating.

This is one I'll definitely buy for the commentary alone. Hope it's a good 'un, although having seen interviews with Glazier he doesn't seem like a laugh a minute.

Perhaps it was supernatural after all. Those motorbike men were ghostbusters!.....they should just stick on a different title sequence and play it back out as ghostbusters 3!

[popcorn]

Absolutely, it's another of the reversals/binaries of the first and second half of the film. Also my impression is that there is a difference in the predominant point of view of the camera and the use of wide angles and close ups. In the first half, the urban locations, the camera is frequently either shooting from the point of view of Scarlett Johansson, as she drives around Glasgow we see what she sees, what she is looking at or it is shot, from just over her shoulder as it were, she is in close focus most of the time, she is narrating the film as it were, the camera is up close and personal. In the latter half of the film, she is shot more often from middle distance or long shot, framed in the scene, the camera's point of view has switched to that of the omniscient narrator watching from a distance, observing the character from the outside. It isn't exclusively that way (for instance, the pulling out after she falls in the street or the close up of the chocolate cake in the cafe) but it definitely felt different to me and seemed deliberate.

Fucking hell, I'd forgotten all about the fog. I definitely need another trip to the cinema for this film soon.

Yes, the POV switch is something I picked up on too. When the POV becomes more distant in the second half - and she becomes more of a subject observed by the camera, rather than the one observing the subjects - it emphasises her vulnerability. The film obviously has a lot to do with the male gaze, and this is when Scarlett's character stops being an alien who exploits men and starts being a human female, which means, sadly, she's vulnerable to attack and exploitation. The camerawork reflects that. You might even say the sequence where she examines her bodacious bod in the mirror reflects that too; it's the bit that's most likely to show up on porn sites when the DVD comes out. "Feast your eyes, lads."

There's something about the moment when she gets in the lorry in the woods that I keep thinking about too. In the first half, the van is one of her weapons, another "skin". When she gets in the lorry at the end, she's trying to escape, but can't find the keys, or doesn't know how the vehicle works... It's a sad moment, because it's like she thought "aha, a big van thing, I know how to use those!" but her failure demonstrates again how she's lost her power.

It's interesting how she dies. The man uses a very artificial thing (petrol, a manipulation of nature) to burn her (fire, simultaneously the most primordial of scary nature things, and a classic icon of man's conquering of nature, stealing fire from the gods etc). It's a far more complete destruction of her body than merely shooting or bludgeoning her. It reduces her to a material that is destroyed rather than a human who is killed. That's emphasised by her alien form not displaying any recognisable emotions about being on fire. Don't know what that means yet.

Going back to my occult reading, after her encounter with the Holy Innocent she loses contact with the bikers, she has lost her powers, she is no longer one of them. In the early part of the film they seem to communicate wordlessly or intuitively to each other (telepathy if you like) and know where to find each other, in the latter half, the bikers are searching for her but seem to have lost her scent setting out in aimless pursuit. Notice it happens after she gets lost in a cleansing bank of dense white fog which is when she abandons the van. The fog also a visually symbolic foretaste of the white snowdrift at the end.

The thing that doesn't add up for me here is that the film absolutely does not portray the bikers as aimless at any point, especially at the end. The editing and camerawork all suggest these guys are moving with terrifying purpose. There's no moment, even in retrospect, to suggest they're actually moving randomly in panic.

[popcorn]

Another thought about that bodacious bod Scarlett has. It isn't "perfect". It's inarguably lovely, but it's not the kind of body that alien seductresses usually have in fiction. She's not totally sleek and svelte and Porsche-like. She is, by ridiculous Hollywood standards, a little chubby, and her legs are a little short. (I can't believe I'm typing all this, but you see what I'm saying.) The way she's photographed isn't the most flattering, either (compare to this semi-NSFW thing http://seereviews.in/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/scarlett-johansson-hot-nude-boobs.jpg). She's actually inhabiting a very human body, even if it is one as gorgeous as that, and not an alien one; but it's alien to her.

[Steven]

They're not showing this film anywhere near me at all, the same has gone for other stuff I've wanted to see in the last few months like Tim's Vermeer and Jodorowsky's Dune. There's at least two Vue cinemas nearby with tons of screens and none of them have anything I've wanted to see. Hopefully it will be somewhere On Demand soon, I hope that kind of model will become an easier way to view stuff when not living in That There London.

[vrailaine]

I emailed a local place asking and they said that they've it requested but have to hear back for when they're gonna be able to show it. Wouldn't be that surprised to see this one treacle down to some smaller towns and whatnot; it'd definitely be able to sell a fair few tickets in most any university town, at the very least.

[Steven]

Ah, I'm completely unaware of the way these cinema chains work. So hopefully this will spread out to the provincials soon then. But I've been waiting to see something like Tim's Vermeer for 6 months and have kept checking and it's obviously too much of an indie title or perhaps because of being a documentary I've not seen it listed anywhere outside of a specialist festival or something. Just wish they could get stuff like that quickly to On Demand because it's just encourages piracy, and believe me I've looked for it elsewhere for ages!

[vrailaine]

I just googled Tim's Vermeer UK Release and it says 17 January 2014, that would've saved you three months!

This film's heaps bigger than that one though, plus I feel like those major Film 4/BFI/National Lottery productions get a bit bigger of a release than your standard art house hit for whatever reason. That being said, the Selfish Giant was a peach of a film from a director with some cred behind her as a rising star of sorts, unsure if it was in any cinemas in Ireland at all so fuck knows what's the setup these days.

[Steven]

I know Tim's Vermeer was released a while ago but my point is nowhere anywhere near me was showing it, only in major cities and a few festivals, same with Jodorowsky's Dune. I doubt most cinema chains show documentaries, but Under The Skin is more likely to spread out to places like Vue cinemas later after the initial release date being a more major motion picture. So I've tried to find both on pirate websites for ages because the On Demand availability is still quite latent for obvious reasons, this is the reason people like Louis CK have done so well to just release something you can download for a small price and fuck all this regional availability stuff!

[vrailaine]

In general, I don't really care about documentaries not getting proper theatrical releases, there isn't as much lost by watching them at home instead, in general. However, for some reason every Alex Gibney film gets a pretty big release here. Of all of the major documentary filmmakers I can think of, he's definitely one of the ones where you gain abso-fucking-lutely nothing from seeing his films on a big screen.
Seems to me that the only time documentaries get beyond the core artsy cinema places is when the cinema has to meet some kind of arts council requirements.

[Steven]

Oh, I get your drift now and agree. Nothing much is gained from docs watched at the cinema. That's why I've been trying to find those 2 docs on pirate sites for a while now, only because I can't find them On Demand, Tim's Vermeer is only listed on Amazon as a DVD release in May FFS, so they are missing a trick I feel. But people are prepared to watch major motion pictures at home in poorer quality or piracy wouldn't exist. But as you said Under The Skin will probably be available more locally soon, sorry to derail the thread. I obviously can't add anything much to Tallulah's musings as I haven't seen the film only the analysis touched upon a few things that have come from my research into some alchemical material.

[Beep Cleep Chimney]

It looks like this only got a proper nationwide release from today.  Must have just been a limited release last week.

I was a bit annoyed earlier in the week as I really want to see this and it didn't look like it was going to be shown anywhere near me, but my local multiplex (an 'Empire' cinema) updated their website this morning, and have started showing it from today, so I'm off to see this tomorrow afternoon.

So, if you previously thought it wasn't showing near you, it might be worth checking your cinema listings again shortly.

[holyzombiejesus]

After the disfigured man enters the black liquid, and SJ stops to look in the mirror/ window, isn't there a shot of a weird black figure, like a skeleton with just the muscle attached but black? I presume this was the actual alien form but who/ what was it?

[Talulah, really!]

It looks like this only got a proper nationwide release from today.  Must have just been a limited release last week.

From the Guardian

Reviews for Jonathan Glazer's Under the Skin were mostly wildly adulatory, but it was never certain that audiences would flock to what remains a challenging piece of cinema. UK distributor StudioCanal released relatively cautiously at 47 cinemas, thus making a strong screen average more likely. So it has proved: the Scarlett Johansson starrer debuts with a hefty £239,000 including £32,400 in previews, or £5,079 per cinema. Under the Skin is playing on 300 cinemas fewer than any other film in the top 10. Expansion from Friday (21st March) is on the way.

The release exists in contrast to the UK strategy 10 years ago for Glazer's last film Birth, which debuted wide in 270 cinemas, beginning its run with £422,000. Over its lifetime, Birth reached £1.18m here, and it will be fascinating to see if Under the Skin's slow-and-steady approach can match that total.

Plus it might pick up a boost from cross promotion from Scarlett Johannsson doing interviews for Captain America, it was mentioned and clips shown in today's BBC Breakfast programme.

It's quite interesting to think that in the space of a month she has had two films out, one of which she appears in nearly every frame but hardly speaks and the other Her[nb]Is there a thread for it?[/nb] in which she doesn't appear but you hear her speaking all the way through in a part originally created by Samantha Morton who played the title role of Morven Callar, a film that shares a similar displaced person's point of view (and ravishing photography and Scottish setting) with Under the Skin.

The film obviously has a lot to do with the male gaze, and this is when Scarlett's character stops being an alien who exploits men and starts being a human female, which means, sadly, she's vulnerable to attack and exploitation. The camerawork reflects that.

It's another of the film's themes, the contrast between control and empathy, empathy leads to vulnerability, when she watches the people on the beach[nb]Echoed perhaps in the old woman who watches as the biker bundles the body of the disfigured man into the boot of the car.[/nb], diving in the sea to rescue the dog, the wife, the husband, she is a detached observer, cut off from recognisable human feelings and hence at no risk herself but as the film progresses she becomes more involved with people, able to empathise and this leads her to breaking away from the control and protection of the bikers and more vulnerable.

Part of the power of the film lies in the reversal of power roles the portrayal of the castration complex gives the character, normally you would expect a scene showing a woman stopping her vehicle to pick up a man on a dark street to have the dynamic that she is the one at risk but the film never really plays like that, equally she doesn't do anything you'd expect from a standard SF/Fantasy film like suddenly shape change to reveal she's actually a vampire space squid from another planet, instead she takes her victims into some strange other dimension to perform some sort of magik ritual.

Related to those points are the scenes where she is in the van and suddenly surrounded and attacked by a gang of young guys, she is totally unaffected as she drives away from them, she is in control whereas earlier on in the film when she is stalking a guy on foot and gets caught up by the group of women going to the rave who only want her to tag along, she seems terrified, it isn't just, I think, that she is on foot but also that they seem to accept her as one of them in a non hostile way, she is coming into contact with feelings she doesn't understand unlike the territorial markings of the young guys attacking the van when she just retreats calmly, the scene at the rave club is the first step outside her normal procedure, her first contact with the infection of curiosity and sympathy with the creatures she finds herself amongst.