Review of Cosmopolis (2012) by Devin R — 20 Apr 2013

The latest film from David Cronenberg is a cerebral quest adapted from a novel by Don Delillo dealing with cyber-capital, specifically focused on a young & emotionally dead financier played by Robert Pattinson (actually quite good here) who spends much of the film cruising across town in a spaceship-like stretch-limo while on the other side of those long tinted windows society is tearing itself apart.

Cosmopolis is a provocative film with ideas, perhaps too many voices in it's own head to really wrestle with a level of coherence, and because of that it's all the more harder to engage with and come away satisfied.

But it didn't leave me feeling that it lacked something to say, or failed to stimulate. Far too many films have both a lack of focus and nothing to say. Many of the concepts dealt with including "cut-throat" business, cyber-capital (rats are the new currency), the commodification of time into a corporate product, and the general metaphorical animal mutations and sadomasochism that are hallmarks of almost any Cronenberg film are certainly intact and fit quite appropriately here.

The decision to pair up Cronenberg with Delillo's novel is a natural fit, and while many will probably complain of it being emotionally dull and nearly impossible to engage with it's off-beat dialogue, I think Cronenberg makes these characters talk and behave in a fashion to purposefully see them as borderline alien creatures, the sly humor is not lost on me if that was the intent.

Cosmopolis is a strange, off-beat journey into a dead soul lost in a dying world, and it is not a smooth ride, but one I don't fully regret having taken.