Evolution (2015)Growing up, life seems like it exists within two worlds: the world you know, and the world you have yet to know. Evolution (2015) is a psychological horror movie about a young boy named Nicolas (Max Brebant) who lives on an isolated island in a community with other boys his age, all tended to by adult women who purport to be their mothers. Nicolas claims that he found the body of a boy beneath the sea--with a red starfish clinging to his belly--but his "mother" (Julie-Marie Parmentier) disregards his story. Shortly thereafter, Nicolas and the other boys are admitted to the island hospital, where they all undergo mysterious operations.
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Evolution is a horror film which is more creepy than scary; there are no "jump out at you" moments, although there is a pervading sense of unease and discomfort. There are also moments of grotesque and disturbing imagery, but is intended to chill the viewer into a state of uncomfortable paralysis, and resists diffusing the tension with a sudden jolt as is common in the genre. Even though Evolution is a svelte eighty-one minutes long, the unrelenting anxiety leaves the audience with the feeling that they have survived an ordeal like Nicolas. Evolution is the kind of horror film which leaves more questions than answers after the credits roll over the cryptic final shot--like why Nicolas is constantly given a strange, purple medicine by his "mother" every night, or why she feeds him a disgusting paste that looks like it was composed of worms. Or questions about what the purpose of the eerie community is, and who the mothers are--or who they serve. Or why the only adults are women who share physical characteristics; they are all younger women in their twenties or thirties, and some--like the nurse, Stella (Roxane Duran)--have red hair. Why are there no young girls or adult men; what is the purpose of this "mother-son" dynamic that feels unnatural, but isn't directly questioned by anyone? These unusual motifs makes the island appear like an alien world. Everything surrounding the bleached white village is a collection of angry, rocky shores. The sand beneath the feet of the boys as they walk through the streets and along the beach is just a bunch of coarse, black pebbles---not really "sand" at all. For all that is implied in Evolution, there might not be any world outside of this one at all. This creates a claustrophobic feel to the community and the film, regardless of the vast, endless ocean around the island. The contrast to this feeling of imprisonment comes in the form of a multitude of underwater shots in the film, many of which are vibrantly colorful and filled with oceanic life. This is the world which is full of life--not the one on the island--and it is this underwater playground which entices Nicolas, even after finding the submerged body of a boy. (Director Lucile Hadžihalilović's film is actually so hypnotic, that whether a trick of the eye or my own perception, I only saw the starfish where Nicolas claims to have seen the waterlogged corpse; this makes it all the eerier when his mother claims she saw no body, either.)
After Nicolas recovers, he and the other boys are taken to the island's hospital facilities. This building is dank and moldy, dripping with moisture; it is dimly lit and would be right at home in a "Silent Hill" video game, where light is preciously scarce, and the hallways are grim, black passages. It is here where the mothers--now acting as nurses and surgeons--begin their morbid experiments, including making incisions into the stomachs of every boy for unknown reasons, and this is the point where a key theme of Evolution unfolds. The film hinges on a traditional fear that children have about guardians and doctors: if they don't tell you everything about what's happening to you, they must be lying to you; what happens when you're right? Evolution has lots of moments where bizarre creatures exist--some resemble a cross between human and amphibian. These unsettling moments include encounters with fetus-like corpses preserved within murky jars of formaldehyde to a strange thing that Nicolas is asked to help bury by his friends. These "monsters" are not of the typical horror movie sort; they do not jump out or attack Nicolas--their mere existence is enough to portend some insidious evil at work. Perhaps this is where the film derives its name, implying that these mutations or chimeric hybrids are born in the spirit of evolution, although they share more in common with Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft than Charles Darwin. Nicolas becomes convinced that the women are conspiring against him and the other boys by concealing their experiments from them. This paranoid terror is heightened when he sneaks out of the house and witnesses a bizarre ritual that has both sexual and primordial elements to it, leaving him confused and repulsed. Nicolas develops a tenuous bond with Stella, who has an ambiguous interest in the boy that is somewhere between attraction or familial protectiveness. The uncomfortable awakening Nicolas experiences in Evolution shares similarities with the awkward discoveries a boy has during puberty. He makes a shocking discovery as he spies on his mother showering mud from her naked body. He trusts Stella enough to have her escort him--while she is also naked--beneath the inky sea one night, where she almost drowns him. His reality blurs with his dreams of the water, which depicts the tendrils of sea anemones suggestively undulating. Nicolas must ultimately cross a threshold with Stella in order to obtain new insight into his world, and in the process must leave his adolescence behind; success requires a long, deep kiss between them, to keep oxygen flowing into his lungs. Nicolas' mother seems more interested in concealing truths that might threaten his child-like innocence, and the revelations which Stella shares makes everything else look scary or unfriendly. Evolution is a metaphor for puberty and the terrifying and visceral experience of evolving into an adult through a form of sexual awakening.
Recommended for: Fans of a slow burn of a psychological horror movie, which dangles elements of supernatural or science fiction before the audience. The surreal events in Evolution also represent a deeper motif about abandoning adolescence for adulthood, and the terrors that come with it.
After Nicolas recovers, he and the other boys are taken to the island's hospital facilities. This building is dank and moldy, dripping with moisture; it is dimly lit and would be right at home in a "Silent Hill" video game, where light is preciously scarce, and the hallways are grim, black passages. It is here where the mothers--now acting as nurses and surgeons--begin their morbid experiments, including making incisions into the stomachs of every boy for unknown reasons, and this is the point where a key theme of Evolution unfolds. The film hinges on a traditional fear that children have about guardians and doctors: if they don't tell you everything about what's happening to you, they must be lying to you; what happens when you're right? Evolution has lots of moments where bizarre creatures exist--some resemble a cross between human and amphibian. These unsettling moments include encounters with fetus-like corpses preserved within murky jars of formaldehyde to a strange thing that Nicolas is asked to help bury by his friends. These "monsters" are not of the typical horror movie sort; they do not jump out or attack Nicolas--their mere existence is enough to portend some insidious evil at work. Perhaps this is where the film derives its name, implying that these mutations or chimeric hybrids are born in the spirit of evolution, although they share more in common with Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft than Charles Darwin. Nicolas becomes convinced that the women are conspiring against him and the other boys by concealing their experiments from them. This paranoid terror is heightened when he sneaks out of the house and witnesses a bizarre ritual that has both sexual and primordial elements to it, leaving him confused and repulsed. Nicolas develops a tenuous bond with Stella, who has an ambiguous interest in the boy that is somewhere between attraction or familial protectiveness. The uncomfortable awakening Nicolas experiences in Evolution shares similarities with the awkward discoveries a boy has during puberty. He makes a shocking discovery as he spies on his mother showering mud from her naked body. He trusts Stella enough to have her escort him--while she is also naked--beneath the inky sea one night, where she almost drowns him. His reality blurs with his dreams of the water, which depicts the tendrils of sea anemones suggestively undulating. Nicolas must ultimately cross a threshold with Stella in order to obtain new insight into his world, and in the process must leave his adolescence behind; success requires a long, deep kiss between them, to keep oxygen flowing into his lungs. Nicolas' mother seems more interested in concealing truths that might threaten his child-like innocence, and the revelations which Stella shares makes everything else look scary or unfriendly. Evolution is a metaphor for puberty and the terrifying and visceral experience of evolving into an adult through a form of sexual awakening.
Recommended for: Fans of a slow burn of a psychological horror movie, which dangles elements of supernatural or science fiction before the audience. The surreal events in Evolution also represent a deeper motif about abandoning adolescence for adulthood, and the terrors that come with it.