The Substance (5 Stars)

The Substance centres on Elisabeth Sparkle, a former Hollywood star whose career has withered as she ages. Once celebrated for her beauty, she is now dismissed, patronised and quietly erased by an industry that values women only while they remain young. Her life is reduced to routine, isolation and humiliation, culminating in her being fired from her long running television job on her fiftieth birthday.

In this moment of despair, Elisabeth is approached by a mysterious medical company offering an experimental treatment known simply as "The Substance". The promise is intoxicating; it will create a younger, improved version of herself. This new body will be flawless, energetic and desirable. The catch is strict and non negotiable. Elisabeth must alternate between her original body and the new one on a fixed schedule. They are not allowed to exist simultaneously. Balance must be maintained.

After taking the treatment, Elisabeth gives birth to Sue, a younger version of herself who immediately thrives in the spotlight. Sue becomes everything Elisabeth once was and more. She's confident, admired and quickly embraced by the same industry that rejected the older Elisabeth. As Sue's success grows, Elisabeth's resentment and dependence deepen. The boundaries between the two selves begin to erode as Sue increasingly resists giving control back.

What follows is a spiralling breakdown of identity, morality and physical form. The rules of the substance are violated and the consequences are grotesque. Their bodies deteriorate, merge and mutate as Elisabeth attempts to reclaim relevance and control. The film moves toward an extreme and deliberately excessive finale in which the cost of denying age, mortality and self acceptance becomes horrifyingly literal.

At its core, The Substance is not about vanity; it is about erasure. The film presents ageing as something society inflicts on women rather than a natural process. Elisabeth is not afraid of getting older in isolation. She's afraid of becoming invisible. The horror comes from the realisation that her value has always been conditional.

Sue represents the idealised female body as a product. She is not a true second self but a commodified version shaped entirely for consumption. Her rebellion is not empowerment; it's the logic of the system taken to its extreme. Youth, once created, refuses to relinquish space. The older self is expected to disappear quietly.

The film also critiques the language of self improvement. The substance is marketed as empowerment and choice, yet it demands obedience, sacrifice and self mutilation. Elisabeth believes she is taking control, but in reality she's submitting to a harsher form of exploitation, one that comes from within as much as from the outside world.

The escalating body horror mirrors Elisabeth's internal fragmentation. As she tries to split herself into acceptable and unacceptable parts, her body literally collapses under the contradiction. The grotesque excess of the final act is intentional. It refuses subtlety because the violence done to women by beauty culture is anything but subtle.

Ultimately, The Substance argues that the pursuit of eternal youth is a losing battle not because ageing is ugly, but because self rejection is corrosive. Elisabeth does not destroy herself by growing older. She destroys herself by agreeing with a world that tells her she should not exist as she is.

Success Rate:  + 2.3