Alex Garland’s films have always been a savvy blend of genre thrills and social commentary. As he’s made the (very welcome) transition from novelist to screenwriter to finally director, he’s consistently excelled at producing multilayered works that contain escapist thrills as well as deeper subtext for those who care to look. 28 Days Later served as both a thrilling, terrifying zombie flick (which, incidentally, revitalized the genre) as well as political allegory.  The same goes for Dredd (a personal favorite of mine), a guns-blazing action flick which also serves as an interrogation of the police state. This synthesis has become more heightened in his directorial efforts, Ex Machina and Annihilation. And now his latest outing, Men, seems to represent a left turn of sorts, and is sure to be his most divisive work to date. Men is almost entirely metaphor and subtext.  Garland always has something on his mind, and that’s never more clear than in this film. While not as successful or intellectually audacious as his previous works, there’s plenty here to satisfy long-time Garland purists, as well as fans of freaking bonkers, gonzo horror.

The film opens on Jessie Buckley’s character, Harper Marlowe (possibly the most literary name ever), in London. It’s not entirely clear what’s going on, but something is amiss. As she stands in a London flat, her nose is bleeding and a man falls to his death outside the window, in slow motion. She then journeys to a country house in Cotson, accompanied by the dreamy, corny, and somehow haunting “Love Song” by Elton John.  (One has to wonder whether Garland considered using “It’s Raining Men” instead, which would’ve been hilariously inappropriate.) Much of the film consists of her settling into the country village. She meets Geoffrey (Rory Kinnear), a caretaker who seems friendly enough but has a tendency for passive-aggressiveness and microaggressions. He insists on carrying her bags but complains all the while, and rudely asks where her husband is. As she wanders through the village, full of lush greenery, she encounters the village’s many denizens—a naked and ostensibly mentally ill man, a policeman, a vicar, a young boy—all of whom are played by Kinnear. Our heroine doesn’t seem to notice. And from there, the film becomes progressively wackier and delves fully into body horror by the third act. (A young couple attending my screening chose to leave halfway through, even before the film goes fully off the deep end.)

Similar to Ex Machina, there’s very little plot here.  The film is essentially a two-hander, with Buckley and Kinnear, in his many incarnations, carrying the plot.  But in contrast to that earlier film, there’s considerably little dialogue here, and Garland’s focus appears to be more on the atmosphere and creating unease in the viewer.  The film partly seems like a travelogue, a travel advertisement for England’s smaller shires. As Harper wanders the village, the scenery (and cinematography) is beautiful, with the rolling fields and bountiful forests swathed in a lush green. The green hues are complemented by a stark sky and ample use of hostile colors which amplify the sense of dread. A dark, mysterious railway tunnel. A country house which is otherwise lovely but whose walls are painted in a violent, vivid red. Despite how lovely the village seems, something feels not quite right. This unease is accentuated considerably by the score, which relies heavily on ominous choral music throughout. In one memorable interlude, Harper harmonizes by modulating the pitch of her echoes in the tunnel. This orchestral piece later becomes part of the score at key points in the film.

Her idyllic country stroll is gradually, increasingly interrupted by the town’s many residents, who have their own unique hostilities and microaggressions. A young boy sporting a creepy blonde doll face mask calls her a “fucking bitch” when she refuses to play with him. She confesses her troubles to a vicar—it turns out her husband committed suicide when she initiated divorce proceedings—and he promptly makes unwelcome advances and insinuates that she caused her husband’s suicide. And so on. All the while, she (and the audience) are haunted by unsettling images that have their roots in pagan and medieval history, the Green Man and Sheela na gig, which recur throughout the film.

Again, the plot here is thin, and the focus really is on the imagery and symbolism, which can at times be heavy-handed.  (Early in the film, Harper eats an apple from the tree and is swiftly scolded by the caretaker. I’ll let you piece that one together.) The big theme here is clearly Toxic Masculinity, which Garland hammers home with nauseating repetition.  Throughout the film, Harper is doubted, blamed, gaslighted, and eventually outright attacked by the men of the village.

Because so much of the focus is on the thematic elements, it becomes clear how…thin the material is.  Yes, the many faces of Rory Kinnear represent toxic masculinity in its various forms, from the outwardly aggressive young boy to the sexually predatory vicar to the seemingly friendly yet equally (if not more) dangerous Geoffrey, with his wide, disarming smile. But Garland isn’t telling us anything we don’t already know. And for my money, this theme was already explored to satisfying effect in Ex Machina, with Oscar Isaac’s and Domnhall Gleeson’s techies representing two ends of the masculinity spectrum, both complicit in the suffering of Alicia Vikander’s android. If the filmmaker felt compelled to revisit that thematic well, one would think he has something new to say, some profound insight. However, the subtext is disappointingly lacking here.  The film clearly takes itself seriously but is nowhere near as profound as it claims to be, particularly in the third act, which contains a meditation on the cycle of violence, and the generational, seemingly inescapable, cycle of wounded men that society produces.

But for a film that’s so heavy-handed in its use of imagery and symbolism, it’s disappointing how little it has to say. Perhaps if it had been less repetitive and the script had been a bit more dynamic, the film’s flaws would be less apparent. (Garland has sometimes struggled with marrying his themes to a satisfying script. This is partly why I prefer the more ambitious, messy, beautiful Annihilation over the claustrophobic, one-note chamber piece plotting of Ex Machina. And we’re not even going to discuss the absolute misfire that is Devs, a miniseries which stretched an already thin premise past the breaking point.) Side note: I absolutely acknowledge my white male privilege in finding the toxic masculinity angle repetitive—women, and any other group marginalized by cis white men, have been dealing with this for millennia. It just feels like a theme that could’ve used more entertaining scaffolding, so to speak.  Or, this could also have worked brilliantly as a short film. Luckily, the two leads turn in powerhouse performances which carry the proceedings. Buckley is brilliant as the besieged widow, gradually letting the audience in on her simmering pain and anguish. And Kinnear proves his versatility by playing several different characters with their own unique personalities.

In any case, I’m not sure that time will be kind to this film. One can easily imagine Garland’s disappointment that Men isn’t sparking a heated dialogue, or that more people aren’t shook by the film’s ambiguous ending. (I personally found the final scene to be confusing and pretentious to an unsatisfying degree; that being said, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.) What people will absolutely remember is the completely gonzo third act. Where else can one see—SPOILER ALERT—Rory Kinnear repeatedly birthing himself in a fucked up body horror spectacle that would make David Cronenberg proud?