Republished from the show notes of my other site, Fuds on Film.
I can’t claim to know a great deal about Irish filmmaker Lorcan Finnegan, but a look though his non-commercial work (which is pretty strong, as quirky commercials go), shows something of a recurring theme of isolation and the inexplicable, which certainly comes to the for in Vivarium.
In which we are introduced to Imogen Poots’ schoolteacher Gemma and her partner, Jesse Eisenberg’s gardener Tom, who are looking to get on the property ladder. Thus a visit to Jonathan Aris’ Martin, an exceedingly strange estate agent who against all logic and reason they follow to an out-of-town development full of identikit, identical homes.
Martin walks off halfway through, but when Gemma and Tom attempt to leave, they only find themselves back in front of the same house. Clearly something strange is afoot, particularly when burning the house down doesn’t stick, it miraculously healing itself. By that point it perhaps should have been expected when a box is dropped off from nowhere, not filled with the usual supplies but with a baby boy, and a message. Raise the child and be released.
Not, they suppose that they have much of a choice, and they raise this rapidly growing weirdo with an overdubbed voice while dealing with the incredible mental stress that this imposes in a variety of understandably unhealthy ways.
That, broadly, is it plotwise for this film, and while there’s some excellent performances from Eisenberg and Poots exploring their character’s reactions to this nightmare, in terms of wider point to the work, I’m struggling to find one. I can’t see if it’s really even trying to say anything other than “wouldn’t it be weird if this happened?”, and yes. Yes, it would be weird.
It is weird. It’s a weird film. And on the whole a film I was happy enough to go along with, as it does manage to take what seems like a slight premise and find new, relatively subtle ways to make it increasingly nightmarish as it goes along without escalating into a sfx sideshow, or attempting to give any real explanation behind what’s going on ,or to what purpose. Which I kind of appreciate, at the same time as wishing that there was at least enough of a hint given in the text to attempt to formulate those answers for myself without it being wild mass guesswork.
So, yes, not the most satisfying end to a film I was continually intrigued by, and I can entirely understand the mixed reception it’s had, but I would say it is worth adding to your watch list and rolling the dice on it on your catch-up service of choice.