First Take: The Lobster- it’s a Favourite alright

SYNOPSIS: In a dystopian near future, single people, according to the laws of The City, are taken to The Hotel, where they are obliged to find a romantic partner in forty-five days or are transformed into beasts and sent off into The Woods.

With our review of The Favourite officially opening proceedings for the year just a few weeks back, it felt like the right time to revisit the work of director Yorgos Lanthimos ahead of his biggest release to date. And his first English language release from 2015 was strange alright.

Lanthimos directs this very unique romance very well, pacing it in a way that makes the 2 hours an enjoyable experience considering the script he and long time collaborator Efthymis Filippou have crafted- it’s a very surreal film that has a lot of themes going on within it, but somehow it has some incredibly well thought out humour too. It’s shot well by Thimios Bakatakis, and while there is no score of sorts, the sound design from Johnnie Burn certainly makes up for it, there is no real need for music in a film like this, knowing that it is a surrealist film after all.

Performance wise, this is an incredible cast. Colin Farrell, Lea Seydoux, John C. Reilly, Ben Whishaw, and Lanthimos’ main duo for The Favourite, Olivia Colman and Rachel Weisz amongst many others just kill it. They know exactly what they have to do in this film, and the execute it incredibly well to make all of it feel real and believable- a big task for a film of this kind nowadays, and considering Lanthimos’ other works, this guy certainly knows how to make some absurd yet brilliant films.

THE VERDICT

It isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but The Lobster does have a very vibrant kind of feel to it. It’s enjoyable, but for people who haven’t experienced a Lanthimos film before, this feels like a nice starting point, especially now that The Favourite is out in cinemas.

RATING: 4.5/5