Guillermo del Toro, the master of modern fairy tales, is offering to share his title with “The Substance” writer/director Coralie Fargeat.
During a conversation between the two filmmakers for Mubi, del Toro praised Fargeat’s “beautifully savage” vision for the twisted drama that stars Demi Moore as an aging actress who takes a serum to birth a younger version of herself, played by Margaret Qualley. “The Substance” won the screenwriting prize at Cannes and the TIFF People’s Choice Midnight Madness Award, as well as has already garnered Academy Award buzz.
“Your two movies [‘The Substance’ and 2017’s ‘Revenge’], for me, are expulsions. They’re literally expulsions of something that seems to me is very personal to you,” del Toro told Fargeat. “It’s like a fairy tale that goes into the dark.”
Del Toro pointed to the comparisons between “The Substance” and “Cinderella” as part of the fairy tale lore. However, unlike Brothers Grimm stories, Fargeat’s feature has a distinctly female perspective, which del Toro credited as its true storytelling strength.
“When you think about a tale like this that is tackled by a man — it’s not saying it’s good or worse — but you can clearly see the point of view,” del Toro said. “‘Death Becomes Her,’ the characters are semi-ridiculous, where here, they are poignant and moving and tragic.”
He continued, “I produced [‘The Babadook’ director] Jennifer Kent [with ‘Cabinet of Curiosities’]. I see the difference in the way [female filmmakers] are perceived.”
Del Toro cited how female directors are deemed “difficult” at times for sticking to their vision for films.
“I remember having a talk with one of the main members of her crew and they were saying, ‘She’s really difficult about this and about that,’” del Toro recalled. “I said, ‘If you were talking about a male director, you would say he has a vision. You would be saying, “Oh, he has a very clear idea of what he wants.”‘”
And that discrepancy has also led to the most cutting edge body horror films as of late, according to del Toro.
“In Mexico and in France, the most interesting genre filmmakers are female filmmakers right now,” he said, “and they are not ‘well-behaved.’”
Fargeat agreed, adding that to be a female director is to grapple with certain gendered preconceptions.
“I resonate so much with what you said about being perceived and the way you are behaving with your work,” Fargeat told del Toro. “I think it’s so true, unfortunately. Authority is still very gendered. A guy with a cap is the figure of the director.”
She continued, “I found my place as a filmmaker in mixing genres, which allows me to go out of reality and create some kind of excess, some kind of craziness, while grounding it in the themes that are really meaning something. To me, I think the fairy tales have this specificity, that they exist from the beginning of humanity, and I think they relate very much to what makes us human. I think that’s why fairy tales are so related to sci-fi because in sci-fi, it’s exactly the same. It’s exploring who we are as human beings, what our fears are.”
Check out the full conversation below.
“The Substance” is now streaming on Mubi.
