Review of Infinity Pool (2023) by Moviemitch96 — 27 Jan 2023

A couple staying in a vacation resort overseas accidentally commit a crime and are arrested, but are introduced to a rather unorthodox means of a penalty: paying to be cloned and watch their doubles be executed instead.

This leads the husband (Alexander Skarsgard) down a dark, obsessive, and dangerously degenerate path as he becomes addicted to and obsessed with committing crimes and watching himself get executed. Written and directed by Brandon Cronenberg (son of famed body horror maestro David Cronenberg, and who previously directed the 2020 gorefest thriller 'Possessor'), this one has a lot of interesting things to say about privilege, wealth, debauchery, etc.

, And it manages to express it all in the most surreal, explicit and grotesque of ways. While not as overly violent and gore-drenched as 'Possessor'', like that film, rest assured there's still plenty of shocking and graphic imagery to be found here in the form of several grizzly murders, untamed orgies, and pure recklessness.

However, it's all rather tasteless and excessive, almost completely overshadowing whatever point or metaphor it's trying to express. When all's said and done, I simply felt a little too icky and like I watched a whole lot of senseless smut and violence that's all style and little substance.

There's clear inspiration from media such as 'The White Lotus' and 'The Shining' to be found here, but if there are any true redeeming factors to be found, I'd say that it's mostly in the cast's performances, particularly Skarsgard's scared as sh*t performance, and especially Mia Goth (who's quickly establishing herself as a true scream queen after this, 'X', and 'Pearl'), who gives an absolutely sinister and unhinged performance for the ages.

Overall, admittedly solid cast performances, and it's got a lot on its mind about the wealthy and their overindulgent tendencies (depicted in blood-soaked metaphor here of course), but it all rings rather hollow in the end by overindulging in itself and all of its excess, coming up well short of Cronenberg's 'Possessor' from a couple years ago, which I actually quite enjoyed.

Wish the same could be said here, but unfortunately, not so much.