“Kinds of Kindness”: Yorgos Lanthimos Does It Again
After Poor Things, the Greek director brings us yet another film about gratuitous sex and abuse, this time with a tinge of gore.
Summary
A man without choice tries to take control of his own life; a policeman is alarmed that his wife, who was missing at sea, has returned and seems to be a different person; and a woman is determined to find a specific someone with a special ability.
Three Short Stories
The summary is certainly quite vague, but that’s because the film also is.
Kinds of Kindness presents three stories, all featuring the same cast members who play different characters each time. Lanthimos counts once again on some actors from his last film, Poor Things, including Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, and Margaret Qualley. Jesse Plemons was the new addition to the main cast.
At first sight, the only connection between these stories is the involvement of a man called R.M.F., played by Yorgos Stefanacos, who has a small, seemingly inconsequential part in the events every time.
Grotesque and Meaningless
Of the filmmakers that are currently being applauded by Hollywood, Yorghos Lanthimos may be my least favorite. Not because I believe him to be a bad director, but because I find his films to be very monothematic. I know many people online would feel inclined to disagree with me, alleging that Poor Things was a masterpiece, and I’m simply not understanding the man’s genius approach to art.
I do not think that every film needs to make sense in the same way a commercial project does. The Argentine film Wild Tales has a similar structure (it features five separate short stories), and I really enjoyed it. Even though the plot of each story does not have any apparent ties to the next, all of them are connected by a strong sense of violence, people losing control and unleashing their animal instincts. The humor can get quite dark at times, it’s not a happy movie at all, but it is possible for the audience to grasp the topic the director wanted to address.
In Kinds of Kindness, the only thing that brings these stories together is sex. All three stories revolve around people being manipulated and abused through sex and getting into progressively more unhinged situations for no reason. What did the director want to communicate with this? I have no idea. And I know Lanthimos has a very particular “style” when it comes to his movies, but seeing this kind of spectacle on screen has become all too common. Especially when it comes to the films the entertainment industry tries to sell as “for the intellectually cultivated”.
Lanthimos always has a group of talented actors to work with and a beautiful visual approach, which I always recognize, but I see nothing of substance in his work. He portrays awful situations just because he can, with no further meaning.
Reception and Box Office
According to The Numbers, Kinds of Kindness had a production budget of $15.000.000. It earned $15.490.195 at the global box office.
Once again, when I checked Rotten Tomatoes, I found a huge gap between critics and audiences’ scores. The critics were not nearly as indulgent as they were with Poor Things, but the reviews are not bad.
In fact, it would not surprise me if this film were to have nominations during the award season in a few months. It’s just the kind of “edgy” content Hollywood loves these days.
