Review of High-Rise (2015) by Andy D — 10 Mar 2017

I haven't read the J. G. Ballard novel nor have I seen any other movies directed by Ben Wheatley. So, I came at this more-or-less completely cold...and it knocked me for a loop. A 1970s high rise apartment building in London (part of a complex designed by Jeremy Irons' Architect) loses power, the residents lose their moral bearings, and we are cast into a dystopian nightmare where society breaks down into all-out class warfare.

Sort of what climate change and the widening gap between rich and poor might bring on, I think. But in the UK, the class differences seem already firmly acknowledged and thus the ingredients for conflict are more omnipresent.

Except nothing is that clear in the film. Our protagonist, played by Tom Hiddleston, is a medical doctor, specializing in lobotomies and brain scans, who moves into the building near the middle floor (25th) and has various interactions with those above him (rich) and below him (poor).

He seems to have no real moral compass at all but might be working through his grief (family all dead) with passive aggression and a tidy apartment that he paints grey. There are a lot of parties in this building.

Wheatley engages in all sorts of cinematic experiments (slow-mo, psychedelic kaleidoscopic split frames, travelling shots, interesting angles) and pushes the boundaries of sex and violence as far as they should go.

I'm not recommending this to anyone who might be easily affronted. And really it is all a bit of a glorious mess but thrilling and weird and better than Hollywood.