2015
Director: Ben Wheatley
Writer: Amy Jump
Lavin had high hopes for the High-Rise. Its component parts were of the highest quality: an on-the-rise director, stellar cast, and fine production team. The preview materials promised a stylish, raucous study of society collapsing in on itself. Anticipation was palpable. Yet something felt a little off about the High-Rise – underlying issues beneath the pristine surfaces. Lavin was disappointed.
Inspired by J. G. Ballard’s 1975 novel, Ben Wheatley’s finely crafted film depicts a brutalist vision of the future, dominated by several gargantuan concrete tower blocks, perfectly composed geometric stacks of pillars, walls and balconies. They provide the future of modern living – state of the art apartments and all amenities on site – school, supermarket, swimming pool. Into the first of these developments moves Dr Robert Laing (Tom Hiddleston), a physiologist hoping to start afresh in a new building. Moving onto the 25th floor, he’s firmly ensconced within the increasingly widening gulf between the poorer residents at the bottom, and the self-contained and decadent top floor residents. Overseeing but detached from the whole affair is the architect Anthony Royal (Jeremy Irons), who’s isolated himself in his penthouse following an injury, while his estranged wife (Keeley Hawes) dominates the parties of the higher floors.
The depiction of the upper floors, all Georgian-themed costume parties and talk of hating the poor for being greedy is a little on-the-nose to be taken entirely seriously. Their opulence leads to greater disparity between floors, and power failure throughout the building. Royal blames the rising qualms on “teething problems”, but soon problems escalate. The building remains so self-contained that residents begin to stop leaving, and increasing pressures pushes them to their more basal instincts, as tribal factions begin to form.
There’s no denying the sheer ambition and achievements of this film. The little details that evoke the specificities of this unusual alternative 70s Britain are spectacular, from the concrete stylings of the apartments walls and balconies, to the kitsch hair and fashions, whilst the general non-descript design of the building interiors and even the look of the food in the isolated supermarket gives the scenario a sense of blank separateness which is inspiring to look at. The way the film can immerse you in this world is exciting. The problems for me started once the film attempted to delve deeper beneath the surfaces.
High-Rise is certainly a film which attempts to address big themes about the human condition and our propensity towards violence and self-preservation once the unspoken rules of our social contracts are broken. The brave decision to set it within the 70s setting from which Ballard’s novel drew from had the potential to create an incredibly ambitious portrait of a predicted future, an alternate reality which could have proved a fascinating counterpart to our current reality. I’m sure that was Wheatley’s and screenwriter Amy Jump’s intention.
Instead, by the film’s second half, the depiction of the chaos engulfing the high-rise overwhelms the clearer intentions of the script. Whilst the gradual formal breakdown of plot structure and filming style undoubtedly immerses us within the vicious hedonistic behaviour of the tenants, this also draws us further from consequences and character relations we had spent the first half of the film building. Simply showing the increasingly debauched and excessive behaviour of the characters inadvertently just covers up the lack of content beneath the surface. A whole multitude of characters and plotlines come and go out of focus, seemingly without any decision on where they are going or which deserve attention at different times beyond superficial reasons. For example, a reveal about a character’s background which might otherwise have proven an important plot point in another film is simply brushed off here, and hardly referenced again. It might be seen as an alternate take on plot points to avoid clichés, but in this case, bundled together with a whole plethora of other unanswered and unrelated stories, it simply makes the film feel aimless and messy.
I haven’t read Ballard’s novel, but I can imagine his trademark clinical descriptions married with his lyrical flourishes would allow his story to delve further into the processes and reasonings behind this microcosm societal breakdown. Instead, the film seems only able to present the increasingly destructive behaviour on a formal level, and struggles to delve further into the actual conflicts taking place between characters, or the specific reasons for individual characters’ actions. Dr Laing is presented as an apathetic observer, mostly keeping to himself and striving for the perfect apartment. In the novel, this could provide a fine set-up for an observational narrator, but here it leaves Laing an underdeveloped and ultimately uninteresting character, only proving his relevance later in the film when other characters demand action from him. The standout character is undoubtedly Richard Wilder, played fantastically by Luke Evans, a motivated documentary filmmaker who becomes the unofficial leader of the lower floors. In a film in which so much of the action is driven by apathy and ennui, his actions stand out for their drive and determination, even as they become rapidly more repulsive.
I respect Wheatley and co. so much for attempting to make a movie that’s truly about something, a film with a vision in both its visuals and design and its thematic focus. Unfortunately for me, the stylistic flourishes which most often really draw me towards a filmmaker and inspire me seemed to cause High-Rise to lose its focus. The rich/poor divide, and the analogy of a society in miniature under pressure have been covered many times before, with much more drive and focus in films like Snowpiercer (2013) and The Mist (2007), both highly stylised genre pics. I think both those films having dramatic aims as the ultimate goals for their protagonists helped give them a greater focus and sense of engagement which I personally found lacking in High-Rise. Simply including a Margaret Thatcher quote about self-sufficiency may seem a neat little nod when we watch in hindsight, but it’s not enough to make up for the lack of thematic focus.
Musings from a Darkened Room 