THE SUBSTANCE — Coralie Fargeat rips beauty standards to gory shreds

Writer/Director Coralie Fargeat's Cannes-winning body-horror blitz THE SUBSTANCE features Demi Moore as an aging star who turns to a mystery drug in hopes of becoming a better, younger version of herself. Fargeat tells host Rico Gagliano about casting Moore, why blood and guts are great metaphors, and the pain of makeup removal.

THE SUBSTANCE comes to theaters in the US, UK, Latin America, Germany, Canada and Netherlands on September 19 & 20. Visit trythesubstance.com for showtimes and tickets.

To stream some of the films we've covered on the podcast, check out the collection Featured on the MUBI Podcast. Availability of films varies depending on your country.

MUBI is a global streaming service, production company and film distributor dedicated to elevating great cinema. MUBI makes, acquires, curates, and champions extraordinary films, connecting them to audiences all over the world. A place to discover ambitious new films and singular voices, from iconic directors to emerging auteurs. Each carefully chosen by MUBI’s curators.

Transcript

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Heads up, this episode includes disturbing horror imagery, adult language and spoilers. What is the first movie that you remember, kind of making an impact on you early in your life as a moviegoer. It was very clearly <i>Star Wars</i>. I'm giving a big thumbs up for those who can't see me. How so, what was-- I can tell you what the impact was for me, but what was it for you? Yeah, it was like the <i>Star Wars</i> or <i>The Empire Strike Back</i> that I saw in the movie, next to my house, there was still was like single screen, you know, next to your house at that time.- Yeah, cinemas.- Exactly. Yeah. And I remember like it transported me into that amazing world and, of adventure, and of cool stuff, rebellion that I absolutely adored. That's tr-- you know, I never thought of Star Wars as being kind of punk. Because it is, it is, it's about a rebellion like literally a rebel alliance. It is and it's a woman princess that, you know, does everything but not what expected as a regular princess. She has, you know, a hair that looks like nothing else before. And she likes to fight, you know, she have weapons, she kind of save, you know, everyone at the end. So, yeah. So that was pretty awesome. That is French writer-director Coralie Fargeat. And like all her movies, her latest <i>The Substance</i> is as punk and feminist as Princess Leia. But way, way more extreme. It's the super satirical story of Elisabeth Sparkle, played by Demi Moore. She's a once huge TV star who's told by her craven producer that she's aging out of Hollywood.<i>People always ask for something new.</i><i>Renewal.</i><i>It's inevitable.</i><i>You know, 50...</i><i>Well, it stops.</i> Devastated, she learns about a drug therapy that promises to genetically split her into two selves. Plain old Elisabeth and a young nubile version of herself named Sue The Catch? Each can only exist for a week at a time, swapping out every other week. And when Sue gets tired of that arrangement, everything goes bloody insane. I'm Rico Gagliano and welcome back to the MUBI podcast. MUBI's the streaming service that champions great cinema. On this show, we tell you the stories behind great cinema. Our horror themed season six is coming soon. But first, here's a horror themed special episode. It's my interview with Coralie Fargeat about <i>The Substance</i> which hit cinemas around the globe this Friday, September 20th. The film was greeted at this year's Cannes Film Festival with a nine minute standing ovation and it won the best screenplay prize there. You'll hear us talk about why a movie this gory and this angry is also this funny. And why Demi Moore was the right icon to star in it. But I started off by asking Coralie how her taste went from <i>Star Wars</i> to body horror. I think it was when I started to be, like, 13 that I discovered more, you know, darker genre like<i>Robocop</i>, or <i>Rambo</i>, or <i>The Fly</i> or basically, it was all the movies that I were not allowed to watch at home because my mother thought they were too violent and they were going to have a bad influence on me. And I watched it at my grandfather's house and he showed me the VHS of all those movies and I felt like, okay, I'm entering a secret society I can finally be part of. They were the world that I wasn't supposed to have access to, you know, because in my generation, when you were a little girl that you shouldn't be interested by those kind of movies. You mentioned David Cronenberg's<i>The Fly</i> just now, do you think that inspired you to make horror movies like <i>The Substance</i>? I wouldn't define... my film as a horror because I think horror is made to really scare. Like to me, you know, horror is more <i>Scream</i> or you know, those, those kind of movies which I love too, but that are more to frighten and to, you know, kind of, yeah, I think body horror for this one at least would be more appropriate because I think it's kind of reflect how you can feel inside and all the weird stuff that, you know, that can happen to you and put you into very bizarre stories. I mean, I will tell you, I went into this movie reticently, not because I hadn't heard anything but great things about it, but because body horror is definitely the genre that makes me squirm the hardest. But on the other hand, there is like undeniably, there's a point in any body horror movie that I've watched where at first it's really disturbing and then it just becomes fascinating. What is it about body horror that is so engrossing, I guess?- Um...- Emphasis on gross. I mean, like, I think if you do body horror, like you're going to play with what's inside your body, you know, everything that is supposed to be hidden and stay inside at some point, you're kind of taking it out, you kind of, you know what we have inside and we wish we could hide you kind of symbolize it by taking it out. That's the powerful symbols that those images can vehiculate an inner world. The one that we wish no one knew about, the one that is supposed to, you know, stay in the dark. And that's why I think the body horror is at the same time so weird, but so compelling because it deals with our dark side. So it's the metaphor of it that is fascinating. Totally. Yeah, totally. I think it's powerful metaphor to speak about our fears, what we hate about ourselves. But we have to deal with those, you know, like we're made of all that. And here I think it's all the more powerful that is related to the exact opposite. Like what is supposed to be beautiful, and the pearly smile and the perfect, you know, like teeth. So the contrast is all the more striking. Yeah, let's talk about the movie. This is a perfect jump to the movie. First of all, where has the spark of this idea come from? Beauty and show business. So to me, it's not at all related to show business. It's just related of how I could feel in my life, since I'm a kid, about how as a woman, you can't ignore your body in the public space. You know, like your body is constantly scrutinized, it's constantly judged. It's constantly commented, it's constantly sexualized, it's constantly... the subject of dirty jokes. And I felt like everything has been kind of organized to make people that it's okay to do that. And like, you know, Elisabeth Sparkle, she just a symbol of what every the woman has to face. Someone who's worth depends on how other people look at her. And when this is taken away from her, it's like, you know, if she was killed in a way. And I could feel those things when I pass my forties and you know, you pass the fuckability, you know, when you think you're past that, like you say, ok, I'm gonna to disappear. Those thoughts are so violent. They are so real, you know, they are absurd but they are so very, very, very real that I said, okay, I have to do something with it. So that's where I decided to do that film. And I think that's why made it into such an extreme manner to reflect the extreme violence of all this. And you know, the way I was living with that. So the main character you choose to kind of carry these themes is Demi Moore's character, Elisabeth Sparkle. Who did you originally have in mind to play that role? So, I can say that when I write, I always write with someone in mind and 100% of the time it ends up being not that person that's going to do the movie. I don't write a lot of dialogues. My movie are all about symbolism. So I need to have an image, I need to write with an image in mind. But you're in your kind of bubble when you have no sense of, you know, reality, what's going to be possible, the availability, you know, all the conditions that then make a movie happen. The only thing that I knew was that I knew it was going to be a role that would be extremely difficult to cast because I knew that I wanted an artist who would be an icon and who would represent in herself already a very strong symbol, that she could bring, you know, to the character. And I know it was going to be a huge challenge to find an actress who would be ready to do that. And had the guts to do it. Exactly, because, you know, even if you can love the film, love the script, having to confront what probably scares you the most, I think you have to be ready to do it. And I think what happened with Demi when we started to think about her name first, I thought it would be something too sensitive. That she wouldn't want to confront this. So I said we have nothing to lose. So let's send the script. But I really don't think that it's something that is realistic. But when I met her, I discovered a very different person than what I, the image that I had of her. What was the image that you had that she then confounded. First I had the image of an actress who was in more mainstream movies, like not genre, not, you know, not indie, not arty, not auteur, you know, so much driven, even if she has worked with great auteur, but you know, your memory is selective some time. And I thought that she would be too concerned about her image to be willing to destroy it. And in fact, when I met with her, she bring a copy of her book that she had just published. That was her autobiography. And I discovered a whole different side of her. First of all that, in the past few years, she had been going through violent things in her personal life, the way she could feel valued or not valued, depending, you know, on the relationship you have. Like, if you can have children, not have children anymore, like all those, things that make you think that you can be erased or you can disappear or you can lose your value. And in fact, she had done already a lot of work on this, on a personal level. She wanted to kind of confront this to find a way to get the control. She had passed the vulnerability point even if I think it always stays with us, somehow. But I think she had gathered enough strength to see it as not threatening. But at the contrary, as being liberating. Is there a scene that she brought something to that you couldn't have put on the page or that wasn't on the page? I mean, the makeup scene, when she preps herself to go out for her date and she can't step that door. For those who don't know, this is a moment in the movie where she's, she tries to go out on a date. She's been... God, how do I even describe that? This movie is so crazy. But she's she's been so upset by the behavior of her doppelganger, her youthful self who gets to go out and have all this fun and who is, kind of, like starting to sap her own life force and she decides that she's going to do something for herself. She goes out on a date.<i>I could book Luigi's at 8?</i><i>Eight at Luigi's it is.</i><i>I...</i><i>I will see you tonight.</i><i>Bye.</i><i>Bye.</i> And basically spends the whole night preparing herself and taking her makeup off and then putting it back on, over and over and over again, until she has this kind of breakdown. And she ends up not even leaving the house- Yeah.- Actually, if you don't mind before we get to Demi's performance there. That scene is so brilliant. Where does it come from? I mean, I think it's something we have all lived but I think it's even more relevant for women who have, I think been in a position what the way they present matters so much, whether they deserve to, you know, be seen and valued, or not. And I think that it's a sin that every woman has lived for real once in her life. Like, we've got to change like five or ten times because all of a sudden we feel that nothing looks good on us and the more you change, the more you feel horrible. And then it's not going to be, your outfit is going to be like your hair, or your makeup or everything and, and I think it shows the mental craziness of the pressure, like the number of takes that we had to do to get there. We knew both of us that it was one of the most important scene of the movie. And so I think both of us, we were super stressed that day. It was a day that was, that was tough. Like for Demi, like having to remove 15 times her makeup in a violent way was very truly physically difficult, painful. But this very, very specific moment at the very, very end, it's the last take that we did at the end of the day. And I think we, I think we both knew that, yeah, the magic happened. I think this is a good moment to get into a different aspect of the movie because as brutal as this movie is in scenes like that are both physically and emotionally, something that really stood out to me is it's humor. And the same goes for your previous film, <i>Revenge</i>. Why is that important to you to inject humor into movies that are so angry. To me, it's a way to make the violence more mental. More, you know, not about the reality of the violence but about the symbol of the violence. That's why I love you know, in South Korean cinema, you have this kind of humor which allows you to go for the ride and to think about the... the topics but without being assaulted by it. You can have a distance because like, you have some way to cope with it and take it out and also laugh and to me, like, satire is such a powerful weapon, you know, to address issues. And yeah, that also very much what I love to do is to use the humor as a weapon to kind of criticize, you know, things that I see around me.- And yeah.- It's almost Brechtian in a way. That's like the most art house thing I've ever said But... that it's like, in an entertaining way, it kind of breaks the fourth wall in a second and it's like we all understand this isn't real, right?- Exactly.- So think about what I'm saying, instead of getting totally caught up in the plot or what's happening on screen, think about what's actually being said. Is that kind of what you're going for? Exactly, I think it's because the intention for, it's not to traumatize people, but it's to make them think about the violence, of what it is. And I think that's the difference of horror, like of torture porn which can be super cathartic. And I think like, it's a big philosophical discussion about how you represent violence on screen and how it helps to, you know, kind of not make it into real life. It's a, it's a bigger conversation. But yeah, basically for me, it's like not to traumatize people, but to use the violence as a symbol of reflection, a symbol of thinking, a symbol of analyzing. But in a way that's not going to be, yes, assaulting you, like, basically. Let me talk about one moment especially then that I think really pulls this off. And by the way, I should give a big spoiler alert to people who haven't seen this movie yet. But Elisabeth at the end has become this like, truly horrific monster. She's like a shambling mound of like random body parts all mashed together. And brilliant moment thematically, she nevertheless tries to put on makeup. But then there's one point in it where she goes to curl her hair, she has just one strand left of hair, and she goes to curl it and in the midst of just being, like, revolted and sad and kind of like impressed suddenly I just like giggled like a little kid. This pathetic kind of curling of one hair. Tell me about coming up with that moment, even. It reappeared when I was writing. I think the ideas, like, come on the page for a very specific reason that I don't analyze at the moment. And I think it was really to make those symbols of, you know, girly stuff you're supposed to do when you prep yourself. Kind of absurd. But also I think in a deeper level, it was important for me that it was the first time where she's gonna look at herself in a tender way, in a kind of self-loving way. She looked at herself in the mirror and she's not disgusted, she's not traumatized. I think it's the first time she looked at herself in a nice way. I love the idea that it's when she's finally doesn't have to care about what she looks like because she's beyond that. That she feels that yes, she deserve her place in society. She deserve to go on that stage and to have her moment. I mentioned that, you know, I was impressed by the humor, but I have to say actually, probably the most unexpected thing to me about this was the way the movie examines aging. The kind of indignity of it and kind of you watch yourself just unable to look how you used to look or do the things that you used to do, or be seen the way you used to be seen. You're, you're actually younger than me, you're obviously younger than this character and younger than Demi Moore. But you capture this so perfectly. How did you lock into that? I would say that, I think it's the most human thing that everyone has to deal with. I think it's the core of what makes us human. I think it's our fear to end. You know, we have all those desires to be eternal. For mankind to try and find a way to escape in a way his mortal condition. You know, to reshape his body so he won't crumble, like to look for his eternal use, like to have all those drinks and, or mythologic stuff that are supposed to give us, you know, like eternity or... and I think all this is kind of symbolizing the artist's position who's always also afraid of some time he's going to be replaced, that another artist is going to come behind him and take the light and and then he's going to finish. So, I think that's really what makes such a deep impactful theme that it's true since the beginning of, you know, humanity, this kind of Faustian pact or our desire to escape our mortal condition. And I think we can be led to do crazy things to, you know, try and get that quest. Speaking of that, while I was watching it, especially the first half of the movie I was thinking to myself, like, would I, would I I try The Substance despite the fact that you make it very clear, all the kind of hoops she has to go through to get The Substance and how many points along the way she really should go, like this doesn't seem like a good idea. This seems like a shady enterprise I probably shouldn't go for. And yet she does it anyway. And I'm like, would I go through all these hoops? And there's a part of me that's like, God, maybe I would. I would definitely do it. It's really pact with the devil. But that's why the devil is so strong and that's why the devil is so powerful because he has tempting arguments. And you don't shy away from the, like you, you play the devil's advocate, like you show Sue, her young doppelganger in a way that is so like, she's luxuriating in youth. And if you're not young you watch it and you're like, oh yeah, that feeling of just like, oh, yeah, I can just, like, stride down the street. Nothing hurts or will ever hurt. I don't have to care about anything. I got my health. It'll never go away. Like all that kind of stuff You really like, amp that up. Yeah, and I think also, like, when everything around you kind of feeds you with the idea that you're not good enough or, you know, past a certain age you're useless. It's tough not to want to have a way to still exist in society. So that's why I think like, of course, there are stuff that we can do on a personal level to try and free ourselves. But I think most of the work has to be done by society itself, to kind of let some room to, you know, exist in a different way than meeting those crazy expectations, because otherwise you kind of alone facing a whole system. And I definitely believe even for me, like, the movie was really liberating and empowering. The movie and the scene and the thinking makes me stronger. But I think it's not something that's going to vanish like that and make you feel"Oh, yeah, I'm great as I am" and, you know, it's not only you with yourself is you and the world, you know, that have to work together. As punk as you can be, as much as you can kick against the pricks, eventually, like something's got to change or you're still just one person against the system. Exactly, yeah. Coralie Fargeat. Her Cannes winning movie, <i>The Substance</i> opens in cinemas around the globe Friday, September 20th. Visit TryTheSubstance.com or check the show notes to find tickets and showtime wherever you are. Meanwhile, coming up in just a few weeks, we'll be launching our sixth season of this very show. In honor of Halloween, we'll be digging deep into the foundations of some of the scariest haunted house movies ever. From the Spanish orphanage of Guillermo del Toro's <i>The Devil's Backbone</i> to the suburbs of <i>Poltergeist</i>.<i>Your TV set is a threat.</i><i>The swimming pool is a threat.</i><i>And all the nice things that you enjoy in your home become malevolent.</i><i>Basically have a gateway into hell in the closet.</i> It's all guest hosted by killer UK critic and horror doyen in Anna Bogutskaya. Subscribe wherever you listen, so you don't miss it. Till then, this episode of the MUBI podcast was hosted written and edited by me Rico Gagliano. Ciara McEniff is our producer, mastering by Stephen Colon. Yuri Suzuki composed our theme music. Thanks this week to Kat Kowalczyk, Michael Lieberman and to Joe Dobkin for recording Coralie. The show is executive produced by me along with Jon Barrenechea, Efe Çakarel, Daniel Kasman and Michael Tacca. And finally do subscribe to MUBI to screen the best in cinema to your heart's content. Head over to MUBI.com to start watching. Thanks for listening. 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