Retro review: Enemy — When your worst nightmare looks like you

The epitome of suspense with a Canadian touch

By: Atiya Malik

Toronto’s skyline in Enemy

The use of spiders in a mystery or thriller film isn’t new, but in Enemy, renowned director Denis Villeneuve leaves his viewers disoriented long after they’ve seen the film. 

Denis Villeneuve is a French Canadian filmmaker who’s best known for directing Dune, one of the most anticipated films of 2021. He has also directed successful science-fiction films such as Blade Runner 2049 (2017) and Arrival (2016). Villeneuve is a four-time recipient of the Canadian Screen Award for Achievement in Direction, including a win in 2014 for his spine-chilling film Enemy. 

Based on the novel The Double by José Saramago, this film begins with the line “Chaos is order yet undeciphered,” which couldn’t be a more straightforward way to foreshadow the film’s confusing and head-scratching nature. Notably, one of the first scenes displays a woman stepping on a spider with a black heel. This is the first time the audience sees a spider and it becomes evident that this insect will hold symbolic significance throughout the film.

Adam Bell (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a history professor who feels trapped in his repetitive and meaningless lifestyle and decides to watch a movie one night to cheer himself up. In the movie, he notices an actor in the background that looks freakishly familiar. Anthony Claire, the actor in the film, doesn’t just resemble Adam in the way that siblings often do. This man is the exact same person physically, down to every scar, hair and even the sound of his voice. The film continues as both men become obsessed with the other and delve into each other’s affairs — but at what cost?

Embed from Getty Images

The cast of Enemy was hand-picked by Villeneuve himself. In an interview with Curzon, he explains how he needed a skilled actor to play the characters of Adam and Anthony because the plot would simply not be believable without the right actor. 

“It’s not about special effects, it’s about acting,” said Villeneuve.

Award-winning actor Jake Gyllenhaal plays Adam and Anthony, two incredibly complicated characters. Gyllenhaal has been in several blockbuster movies, including Spider-Man: Far from Home (2019), The Nightcrawler (2014) and Source Code (2011). In Enemy, Gyllenhaal’s riveting use of facial expressions fully engrosses viewers: the genuine fear, shock and disturbance that he can convey with just his expressions tell a story within itself.

Embed from Getty Images

Mary, Adam's girlfriend, is played by Mélanie Laurent, a well-known French actress, filmmaker and singer. She is best known for her role as Alma in the film Now You See Me (2013). Sarah Gadon, a Canadian actress best known for her work in Dracula Untold (2014), plays Anthony's wife.

The film production does an impeccable job of capturing shots of Toronto from several angles and perspectives that make the city feel lonely and confined, while also displaying iconic shots of Toronto and Mississauga, Ont. city skylines. Residents living in the area might even be able to recognize well-known street names such as Adelaide or Rathburn. 

Toronto’s cityscape captured in Enemy.

Mississauga’s iconic Marilyn Monroe towers pictured in Enemy.

In an interview with VODzilla, Villeneuve talked about carefully selecting Toronto as the film location. “The city had that kind of personality, the paranoid, oppressive feeling and I was looking for that landscape, something with pressure,” he said.

The energy in New York or Chicago is similar to what Villeneuve was seeking. However, he wanted to film in a city that hadn’t been as well-loved by the camera, and what better place than one close to home?

The cinematography in Enemy truly carries the movie. The plot is predominantly told through visuals as the first half of the film has minimal use of voice and conversations. This inevitably forces the viewer to focus on every piece of visual information, including brightness. 

Enemy is a film that is very dark… literally. It’s as if while editing, someone discovered the saturation button and turned it all the way down. This is a strategic choice because the lack of colour itself expresses unsettling feelings of suspense and mystery. The world should not be this grayscale.

The film was also heavily dependent on the use of music, and it did not disappoint. The music selection is eerie and disturbing, making it more likely for the viewer to feel uneasy.

The use of spiders in Enemy was somewhat of a weak point. It was obvious that there was a deeper meaning behind their seemingly random appearances, which was intriguing. However, it’s very unclear as to what that meaning is because it’s left open for interpretation.

One compelling explanation is that the spiders symbolize a fear of commitment because Anthony and Adam both feel trapped and disconnected in their romantic relationships. In a scene with Anthony, his pregnant wife asks him if he’s “seeing her again,” implying that he has been unfaithful in the past. In a scene with Adam and his mom, she accuses him of having trouble with sticking to one woman. The spiders could represent Anthony and Adam’s unfaithful natures and display how it increasingly consumes their lives… right up until the film’s final shot.   

With a run time of 90 minutes, Enemy is a film that holds your attention sporadically. The film, adapted from the novel The Double, has a truly complex and nail-biting plot that you won’t find anywhere else. Are Anthony and Adam long-lost brothers, clones, a figment of one’s imagination or all the above? These unanswered questions serve as both the film’s strength and weakness, leaving you with thoughts that linger on for far longer than expected. However, its execution could have been clearer, particularly regarding those spiders.

The viewer is left wanting more while staring at a black screen wondering, “What on earth did I just watch?”

Rating: 3/5 stars

Review: Dune - Directed with Canadian spice

Canada’s own Denis Villeneuve attacks the legendary source material with his signature intellectual grandiosity

By: Thomas Publow

Logo for Dune

Denis Villeneuve is a filmmaker that Canada holds dear. The French Canadian director is a four-time recipient of the Canadian Screen Award and has taken his talents all the way to an Academy Award nomination. His career is marked by dips into the realm of science fiction, and with films like Arrival (2016) and Blade Runner 2049 (2017), he has established himself as an accomplished lover of highbrow storytelling juxtaposed with accessible action. It is this exact juxtaposition that makes his take on Frank Herbert’s seminal sci-fi novel, Dune, stand out amongst this year’s crop of blockbusters.

Dune was one of this year’s most anticipated films, especially following the pandemic delays of 2020 that pushed the film’s release back by an entire year. Amidst these changes in release time came some controversial changes in the film’s distribution. In late 2020, Warner Bros. announced they would be releasing the entirety of their 2021 slate of blockbusters (17 films in total) not only in theatres, but also on the streaming service HBO Max. Films such as Wonder Woman 1984, The Matrix 4 and, yes, Dune were included in this “shocking” release strategy, one that Villeneuve is adamantly against.

In an article Villeneuve penned for Variety, he accused Warner Bros. of no longer being a team player, saying “there is absolutely no love for cinema, nor the audience here.” He noted that streaming services are positive additions to the entertainment industry, but they “alone can’t sustain the film industry as we knew it before COVID-19.” Villeneuve said he believes the future of cinema is no different than its past and that movie theatres will always be vital to enjoying film because human beings need the communal nature they bring.

Dune “is by far the best movie I’ve ever made,” wrote Villeneuve. “My team and I devoted more than three years of our lives to make it a unique big screen experience. Our movie’s image and sound were meticulously designed to be seen in theatres.”

The film is one to experience on the biggest screen possible. Its scope is far too large to be enjoyed properly from home, and Hans Zimmer’s score is a soon-to-be classic piece of cinema music that must be heard at the volume that a movie theatre permits. It sounds like nothing before it, and I truly see it going down in the history books alongside the likes of Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings. It is also a film that would be best enjoyed, especially if you have not previously read the novel, knowing as little as possible beforehand, so this review will be spoiler-free.

Embed from Getty Images

The cast of “Dune” at the 78th Venice International Film Festival on Friday, Sept. 3, 2021 in Venice, Italy. (Daniele Venturelli/WireImage)

Dune comes equipped with a star-studded cast including Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Zendaya, and many more. It follows Chalamet as Paul Atreides, son of Duke Leto Atreides (Isaac) and Lady Jessica (Ferguson), as they take the rule of the planet Arrakis. Arrakis is a desert planet, and the only source of “spice,” a substance that boosts human health and is essential for interstellar travel. Throughout the film, Paul is coming into his own, largely due to the psychic training of his mother, and is having visions of a girl from Arrakis named Chani (Zendaya) that give way to his potential true identity.

Ferguson’s performance gives the film humanity. Lady Jessica is both a loving mother and a woman with power possessed by very few. Ferguson perfectly balances these two facets of her character, often in one scene. This is not to detract from the performances of the rest of the cast, however, as the entire ensemble demonstrates the immense complexities of their unique characters. 

The production design functions like another character in the film. Perhaps nowhere better can the scope of the film be understood than through its creation of whole other planets that simultaneously feel completely familiar and also like nothing the world has seen before. The sets are grand while also being muted, uniquely shaped while also seeming in place. Some weapons feel like ancient artifacts while others feel like they are from a distant future. The old technology seamlessly mixes with the new technology, seeming like they simply function in tandem. It is the sandworms, however, that are the true production accomplishment. They were terrifying yet did not at all look out of place. From the way they moved through the sand, to the way they created vortexes to consume what walked over them, they further elevate the film to masterpiece territory.

Greig Fraser’s cinematography is brilliant. It felt almost jarringly bland at first; there was a lack of vibrancy that is usually expected in blockbuster films like this. It becomes more and more apparent, however, that this was an intentional form of subversion. The desert looked exactly like that, a desert. From the way the interior scenes were lit, to the instances of a sandy blur blocking the audience’s vision of the events on screen; everything was muted in a way that helped ground this fantastical world in reality.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by DUNE (@dunemovie)

Alongside Jon Spaihts and Eric Roth, Villeneuve helped craft the screenplay. It is filled with detailed exposition and Villeneuve only succeeds in crafting another world so successfully due to this. The screenplay and direction alike function through the balancing of some of 2021’s most intimate, almost mundane scenes coupled with some of the year’s most spectacular. One could not work without the other, as they each play into giving everything the audience experiences meaning and justification. It is Villeneuve’s perfect tethering act of an intellectual spectacle that serves as his greatest success across his filmography, Dune being no exception.

The film is a vital addition to his catalogue, a passion project he has been yearning to craft since he was 13. In an interview with The Atlantic, Villeneuve stated that he kept the book beside him while filming. He said that he “made this movie for himself” and that everything that the audience experiences is there because he loves it. Watching this movie, the level of effort put into every second seen on screen is a demonstration of a man’s love for a seminal piece of fiction in his life, something vital in the creation of a classic.

Herbert’s novel is notoriously dense, and the film benefits greatly from not compromising this for the sake of accessibility. With a nearly 156-minute runtime, it is for the best that the film is left on a cliffhanger. With conflicts explored to great measure, it deserves a second part that brings these conflicts to rest, making 2023’s Dune Part 2 an anticipation hotbed like its predecessor. Villeneuve’s passion that has been brewing since early adolescence coupled with the film’s staggering reported $165 million budget lifted a novel that Hollywood feared adapting into one of the year’s best. In the words of Chani, “this is only the beginning.”

Review: Polytechnique - In memory and reflection on International Women's Day

By Federico Sierra

On March 8, women and their stories are celebrated worldwide to remind us to constantly strive towards equality in our communities. Women have come a long way to gain rights and equality; however, as Denis Villeneuve’s 2009 film Polytechnique shows us, women in modern society are still victims of misogyny.

On a cold, snowy night of December 1989, a young man stepped into an engineering college in Montreal, Canada, wielding a rifle where he shot 14 women before shooting himself. The shooter wrote a confession letter declaring a personal vendetta against feminists because he felt like they had ruined his life. This incident became known as the Montreal Massacre, the deadliest mass shooting in Canadian history.

Denis Villeneuve’s breathtaking directorial debut Polytechnique examines the gruesome incident without sentimentality. The black and white cinematography creates a detached sensation between the viewer and the film allowing us to absorb this disturbing catastrophe. It also subtracts any trace of blood from the colour palette and thus avoids transforming the hate crime into a sensationalist piece. With the glacial cold atmosphere created by the winter weather, combined with Villeneuve’s realistic approach to craft the scenes, Polytechnique plays like a horror documentary but often feels like a nightmare in which an evil presence is out to hunt us.

Polytechnique casts no judgements, nor aims to open traumatic wounds for commercial purposes. It’s a bitter and icy document which challenges viewers to confront this horrific event with factual accuracy.

The film opens with the shooter (Maxim Gaudette) alone in his bedroom, with his rifle pointed at his own head. Right from the start, Villeneuve paints the image of the shooter as an isolated, deprecating misogynist incapable to integrate into the community. One of the key factors of this film is that it never once mentions the name of the shooter. By doing so, it rips away any power or memory of who this person was and instead asks us to judge the characters of the film solely on their actions.

Polytechnique’s eye-opening reenactment of the painful memory of the Montreal Massacre at first may come across as insensible and unnecessary. Even at a 77 minute runtime, Polytechnique is definitely not an easy film to digest, but thanks to Villeneuve’s uncompromising storytelling, this cold film invites us to meditate about the ways we confront and overcome traumatic experiences.

 Villeneuve enhances these tragic events by lending multiple perspectives. The story follows two engineering students, Jean-Francois (Sebastian Huberdeau) and Valerie (Karine Vanasse), as they prepare to write their midterm exams. They are both part of the class where the shooter opens fire. They are both survivors of this monstrous act, and in the aftermath of the attack we continue to follow them to observe how their lives are impacted and forever changed. Polytechnique serves as an alarming reminder of the senseless, violent evil that exists in this world, but the moral of the story goes beyond reminding us that we must continue to hope and love, despite the horrors events such as this instill in our collective memory. 

The film ends on a hopeful note with a letter Valerie writes after learning that she is pregnant, “If I have a boy, I will teach him to love. If I have a girl, I will tell her that the world is hers.” A baby, a new life with boundless opportunities, reminds us that love and forgiveness are lessons we pass on to each other and become the most powerful of tools. Polytechnique breezes by like a whisper in the dark that shows us why it’s OK to feel afraid but presses on the value of finding the courage within ourselves to create a better world and to cultivate a society where we can coexist in harmony.

In memory of the women who lost their lives in this harrowing attack: Genevieve Bergeron, Helene Colgan, Nathalie Croteau, Barbara Daigneault, Anne-Marie Edward, Maud Haviernick, Maryse Laganiere, Maryse Leclair, Anne-Marie Lemay, Sonia Pelletier, Michele Richard, Annie St-Arneault, Annie Turcotte, Barbara Maria Klucznik-Widajewicz, Sarto Blais.

Photos: Polytechnique Trailer