Velvet Buzzsaw

Velvet Buzzsaw

Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Rene Russo, Zawe Ashton, Toni Collette

Directed by Dan Gilroy

The Story:
Art critic Morf (Jake Gyllenhaal) is hailed as the god of the industry, whose review could make or break a career, and this world is littered with a slew of high-priced obnoxious patrons who either peddle the artwork or are pretentious enough to buy them.  Morf is friends with famed Haze gallery owner Rhodora Haze (Rene Russo), who's belittling her assistant Josephina (Zawe Ashton) for always being late, as she begins an affair with Morf.  One day Josephina finds her upstairs neighbor dead, and his house littered with thousands of original art paintings he did - paintings he wished to be destroyed in his will.

Enamored with the pieces, Josephina takes them to her home where Rhodora praises them and tells Josephina that she will work with her to sell them.  As everyone around them admires the paintings, they also begin dying one-by-one, and it seems that these mysterious paintings have a spirit attached to them that doesn't want them being seen.

The Synopsis:
Back in early 2019, it was announced that Dan Gilroy - the writer and director of one of 2014's most talked-about films "Nightcrawler" - was writing and directing a film for Netflix called "Velvet Buzzsaw," and it was going to be a no-holds-barred horror satire of the art world.  I was eager to see it, but after it came out the reviews were less than stellar, so I shelved it until I found time to finally see it.  Having finally viewed it, I can say that this was something I didn't need to see day one, and while the film does do a decent job at poking fun at the rich and pretentious, it also didn't stray away from the generic paint-by-numbers horror concept.

The film features a slew of wealthy socialites and art critics whose names themselves ooze pompous arrogance - Morf, Rhodora, Josephina, Gretchen, Jon Dondon, Damrish, Bryson, Piers - each one accompanies a character that's pretty much wholly unlikable, which is where the generic horror trope sets in: we see each character as placecards, and the only delight we get is to see who dies when and in what fashion.  Also like most horror films, their deaths occur at the hands of that which they despised most in life, and also occur just when they're about to break the case in the big mystery (one death in particular takes place after the victim discovers something shocking and leaves a vague message for someone else about that shocking revelation but of course never reveals fully what it is before they're offed).

They say art is something that can be appreciated or devalued based on the person, and "Velvet Buzzsaw" does a great job at portraying art as wholly subjective.  There's some truly beautiful pieces that characters scoff at, while they praise the most mundane of works, and it's this subtle jab at the art world that drives the horror that comes, as they fall victim to that which they most despise.  Unfortunately we don't care about them, and it leads to a more gleeful moment when we know they're going to expire due to an elongated solitary moment as the music intensifies.  Gilroy is not subtle in the deaths, and it feels like watching a classic horror film or a high school play where a character is given final moments on stage alone before they expire.

The film's strongest hand is in the cast, which performs with a perfectly delicate balance of reality and satirical humor.  Jake Gyllenhaal (who Gilroy worked with in "Nightcrawler") gives a great performance as the lead, an art critic as confused about his life as he is about his sexuality, who sees the world in purely aesthetic pleasures, and is the most offbeat character you can imagine.  Rene Russo (who Gilroy also worked with in "Nightcrawler") plays your typical cold-as-steel art gallery owner who doesn't have permanent friends and who exploits any moment for her own gain.   Zawe Ashton gives the most confusing performance as Rhodora's former assitant-turned-partner Josephnia, who comes across as a wholly vapid, vain, conceited person but also has an odd strange streak about her that's totally humorous (especially her wide-eyed crazed gaze over the most mundane things like having her car stuck behind another car).  The remaining big-name cast members - Toni Collette, Natalie Dyer, Daveed Diggs, John Malkovich - all also give stirring performances that would've fallen deaf if done by lesser actors, and again this is the main strength the film delivers.

For a movie that's supposed to poke fun at the art world, it also immerses itself in the jargon and lingo, providing strange clunky dialogue that doesn't fit in with the whole film, and also includes several scenes that have no meaning to the overall plot at all.  The editing too is surprisingly tame, something slightly above a made-for-TV film but far below Gilroy's best.  The script is simplistic and there's no real twists or turns to expect, especially for someone who's a horror aficionado. Or, like the film suggests, I'm simply looking at the film the wrong way.

The Summary:
Film, like art, is subjective, and "Velvet Buzzsaw" does do a decent job at satirizing the high falutin art world, but reduces itself to a paint-by-numbers copy of what could've been a grand work of horror art.

The Score: C+