Beau Is Afraid

Ari Aster’s previous features don’t really prepare the viewer for Beau is Afraid. It’s not that they are horror films or that they follow generally conventional plot formats. It’s the sheer overload of imagery for a relatively simple plot that sweeps through the film which may or may not also have some jabs at the state of the US today.

Making plans to visit his mother (who appears to dominate his life) Beau Wassermann (Joaquin Phoenix) looks air travel – that goes through the floor when his apartment is runover by the destitute inhabitants of the streets around his place. The attempt to get there by road is derailed by an accident where he is taken in by family that are still mourning a son and with an infuriated daughter Toni (Kylie Rogers) who is turfed out of her room and continuously munching on prescription drugs.

Getting free of them, he lands up in a forest community of players where Beau is led though an animated surreal land with a story within a story. Finally busting through all this he makes his way to his mother’s where events take a turn for the very bizarre.

For three hours Ari Aster bombards the viewer visually and aurally with colourful language and images. Throughout there’s Beau in the middle seemingly with no control over his actions or direction. Phoenix is pretty good looking slept in for most of the film bemused by what is going on, seemingly on strings at times.

This is curious as it could be taken that Aster is using Beau as a conduit to slap at America’s social ails such as the opioid problem and the terrible homelessness that blight many cities. Even at the more conventional middle to upper class sequence when he is welcomed by the family. They are dysfunctional with father Roger (Nathan Lane) and mother Grace (Amy Ryan) just about holding their life together.

However that tends to breakdown when Beau meets Penelope (Hayley Squires) in the forest sequence and taken to watch the play that he falls into and sucked out when they are attacked. That suggests that Beau is a more than just an avatar for Aster. But when he gets to his mother’s place there are references to her job and big pharma. So we are back to satire and a monumental performance from Patti LuPone as Mona Wassermann

There are recurring references to past scenes and previews of what is to come: everything has a place. Its bold audacious filmmaking that could easily be slapped for over-indulgence with the auteur given free rein to do what he wants, and box office returns are and afterthought.

It is bound (and has) split opinion. Those expecting a pitch-black comedy may be disappointed. Black it certainly is but humour in the eye of the beholder. But crucially for a film of this length and complexity it doesn’t drag it is very watchable. What the viewer feels about it after is another matter.

Beau is Afraid will be in UK cinemas from 19 May 2023.