zay! ♡’s review published on Letterboxd:
yeah that’s right: I loved INFINITY POOL so much that I finally took the plunge in finally watching Brandon Cronenberg’s two previous films after years of waiting
POSSESSOR is a damn great movie— “confident” is probably the best word to describe it— and it helps for a movie and a filmmaker who’s (at least for the foreseeable future) is gonna constantly be compared to his dad— which’s becoming more and more of a shame to me the more and more obvious it becomes that he really is doing his own thing with just a few overarching (and tangential at best) influences from David
this is a lot more EXISTENZ or SCANNERS than full-on body horror— and even then— that’s doing a huge disservice to the phenomenal worldbuilding here— it’s something I also really appreciated in INFINITY POOL— how Brandon really does have such unique ideas that he manages to seamlessly incorporate into realistic settings— this movie’s whole hook of “corporate assassins possessing people to frame them for crimes” is legitimately phenomenal
the main performances— despite not being super fleshed out— are incredibly multi-layered and are just so much fun to pull apart, the cinematography is absolutely stunning and filled with vibrant colors, the score bangs, the gore is fucking brutal, and the plot— while not as consistently fun as it could be— has a lotta amazing individual moments and themes (everything from how our jobs dehumanize us to trans identity to acting itself) and builds up to a third act that really makes the whole thing come together (so much so that it makes me wish the whole movie was that good)
and yet— despite all that— I still feel like I’d give the edge to INFINITY POOL as— despite being messier, it’s also a lot more ambitious— whereas this is more polished, but ultimately didn’t feel like it went as far as it could’ve for me— not to mention having the same problems that I’m already starting to pick up on: a little slight, goes on a little longer than it should, a slight preference for style over substance, yadda yadda yadda
but make no mistake— I don’t wanna keep making comparisons, ‘cause I really fucking loved this— the stuff that works really fucking works— and I could easily see myself watching it again soon
![Boy Roarbison [fka Nag Champion]](https://a.ltrbxd.com/resized/avatar/upload/2/6/5/9/8/shard/avtr-0-80-0-80-crop.jpg?v=9374058d24){kind=small}
