The Beast
A novella by Henry James inspires Bertrand Bonello’s thought-provoking and modern cinematic thriller.
Léa Seydoux
The French director Bertrand Bonello has been making films for a quarter of a century and The Beast is his tenth feature. Even so he is one of those writer/directors whose work is better known in France than outside it despite the fact that a number of his films have been widely released. Among them have been Tiresia (2003), The Pornographer (2001) and House of Tolerance (2011). If his work has often had a strong sexual edge, it has also shown a certain artistry but his latest undertaking, The Beast, is at once more ambitious and more memorable than any earlier works of his that I have seen. It may acknowledge taking a central idea from a novella by Henry James – The Beast in the Jungle published in 1903 – but it puts it in a very different context and adopts an approach that might well turn this into Bonello's most widely discussed film yet.
That The Beast is a bold and very individual work is manifested even before the title comes up. What we first see against green screen is the image of the lead actress Léa Seydoux as though she is auditioning for the role that she plays here, that of Gabrielle Monnier. A voice gives her instructions about what to do and then relevant props pop up on screen including a knife. This introduction is so stylised that it alerts the viewer to this being a work not based on naturalism. It also makes it clear that the drama will lead to menace and starts to hint at the theme taken from Henry James. His story concerned a man whose obsessive fear of a catastrophe happening to him leads to his being unable to commit himself to a relationship until it is too late. The freedom of Bonello’s approach in putting that notion at the centre of his film is illustrated not only by making the character thus trapped a woman but by choosing to amplify her tale by turning it into a narrative in which three different versions of her play out in distinct periods, namely the Paris of 1910, the Los Angeles of 2014 and a world dominated by AI in the year 2044.
The Beast starts off in 1910 and introduces us to Gabrielle as a married woman who encounters a man named Louis (George MacKay) who is destined to become central to her life, but it soon includes scenes set in 2044 which again feature both of them. Widescale pressure is being applied to individuals to undergo treatment through which their DNA will be purified. The process will remind them of their past lives but, if accepted and completed, it will eliminate their particular human responses including their fears and they will become more or less robotic as a result. Gabrielle is in two minds about this and, before this issue is finally resolved, The Beast moves on to show us substantial scenes that take place in 2014. In this setting Gabrielle is unmarried but Louis reappears albeit that his character now becomes very different. He is an incel whose feelings of rejection make him a menace to any woman, but Gabrielle feels sorry for him and in trying to comfort him is unaware that she is putting herself in danger.
That stylised preface has warned us against taking this film too literally and indeed this work exists first and foremost to explore ideas which we are invited to consider. Despite its origin in Henry James, its mix takes it far away from being a period piece and, given its play on identities, many critics have seen it as a Lynchian kind of movie. But in fact its heart is Orwellian and in the manner of 1984 its concern is the importance of remaining human and individual in a world that may already be putting that at risk as AI becomes more and more significant in our lives. Equally central and readily relatable to audiences is the film’s emphasis on the fact that Gabrielle's premonitions of disaster which could relate to some general catastrophe nevertheless become linked to her sense that Louis is in one way or another crucial to her destiny. The settings of this film are not arbitrary: Paris was subjected to a great flood in 1910, Los Angeles in 2014 experienced an earthquake and the futuristic world of 2044 represents an age already in sight in which technology could endanger us. Nevertheless, by stressing the risk inherent in becoming a couple, the chance that you are misreading the character of your partner, the film renders this a key example of both the fear that affects Gabrielle and the risk that has to be accepted if one concludes that remaining human and vulnerable is what matters.
In asking one to think about the questions raised by his narrative, Bonello is being somewhat Brechtian and he is ready to introduce references direct or indirect to relatively avant-garde art. In 1910 Gabrielle is a pianist coming to terms with the music of Schoenberg and her first encounter with Louis has him referring back to an earlier meeting which she cannot clearly remember, a scene which carries an echo of a very intellectual work, Last Year in Marienbad the Alain Resnais film of 1961. Although Bonello's approach is helpfully straightforward rather than flashy, he builds up intense drama very effectively from time to time including one passage that brings Hitchcock to mind (and, no, that's not in the Los Angeles footage).
Having set up such an unconventional film, Bonello proves less sure-footed in the second half. On occasion he surprises us in a good way (it’s an admirable choice to make Gabrielle's husband in the Paris segment a sympathetic character and Martin Scali is excellent in this role). But, in contrast to that, it seems a contrivance to make the Louis of 2014 such an extreme figure. Not only does this part of the film feel drawn out but its climax is built up in a too familiar way only to lead to an inept borrowing from Michael Haneke's 1997 masterpiece Funny Games. The cast here is a strong one with Léa Seydoux on her best form. George MacKay is accomplished too, but his rather youthful looks make him less than a perfect fit despite both he and Seydoux being in their thirties. Ultimately this fascinating film falters too much to be a master work but it is thoroughly intriguing and should stimulate lively responses. Furthermore, even though the L.A. scenes could be shortened to advantage, Bonello brings off the remarkable trick of making the time fly by for the viewer regardless of the fact that The Beast lasts for almost two and a half hours.
Original title: La bête.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Léa Seydoux, George MacKay, Martin Scali, Guslagie Malanda, Dasha Nekrasova, Elina Löwensohn, Marta Hoskins, Pierre-François Garen, Lukas Ionesco, Stéphane Soubiran, Julia Faure, Kester Lovelace.
Dir Bertrand Bonello, Pro Justin Taurano and Bertrand Bonello, Screenplay Bertrand Bonello, from a treatment by Bertrand Bonello, Benjamin Charbit and Guillaume Bréaud loosely based on The Beast in the Jungle by Henry James, Ph Josée Deshaies, Pro Des Katia Wyszkop, Ed Anita Roth, Music Bertrand Bonello and Anna Bonello, Costumes Pauline Jacquard.
Les Films du Bélier/My New Picture/Arte France Cinéma/Sons of Manual/Ami Paris/Jamal Zeinal Zade/Canal+/Ciné+-Vertigo Releasing.
146 mins. France/Canada/Switzerland. 2022. US Rel: 5 April 2024. UK Rel: 31 May 2024. Cert. 15.
