The Beast

The Beast: A Sonic Journey into the Depths of Love, Loneliness and Destiny

A sharp knife jabbers deep underneath the skin without it ever causing any fatal wounds. The Beast directed by Bertrand Bonello knows how to do that with utmost finesse. The pain isn’t instantaneous and neither is it obvious, it is rather a lingering feeling of existential pain. Bonello’s film situates love in the most vulnerable state and suffocated emotionally, refusing to submit to the preconception of nurturing life. In its place, the film delves right into the three main aspects of life: confort and grief brought by birth, death and the bittersweet realization that time waits for none. And despite all the dire pain that the film puts its audience through, it easily takes the cake as one of the best cinematic experiences of 2023.

At the core of the film: The Beast, is the life of Gabrielle, wonderfully played by Léa Seydoux. Based on a 1903 novella written by Henry James named The Beast in the Jungle, the film portrays loss of opportunities through a more futuristic and drama infused lens.

In the eyes of Gabrielle, emotions have only been proven to be humanity’s greatest weakness and in order to feel more ‘produced’ people use a process called ‘emotional sanitation’. This makes Gabrielle decide what she wants to do the most above all else, and that’s of getting rid of all the love and pain she feels, making her undergo the same process which results in sending her into various timelines, in which she gets to experience glamourous 2014 Los Angeles and the Paris of La Belle Époque in the year 1910.

Gabrielle’s life has been split across various time zones and as a result, she is able to form an interesting relationship with Louis, who is played by George MacKay. Louie goes back and forth with Gabrielle and it does not matter what time period it is due to this concept being ageless, love and pain has always revolved around them. In Paris, Gabrielle is struggling to keep her sanity intact due to Louie constantly being a threat by being an aristocrat desperately trying to seduce her. While in Los Angeles, Louie plays the role of a sociopathic loner, who for some reason tries to follow her everywhere she goes. Now, in the 2044 the roles are reversed in which Louie has turned into a familiar yet unknown figure that she cannot seem to forget.

The Beast Within: A Story of Fear and Regret

The Beast Within, authored by James, is a tale revolving around a character by the name of John Marcher who grapples with the concept of time. The character conjures a fear of confrontation in relation to an inevitable event which is sure to transform everything in its wake. Despite Marcher still being able to feel love, he is unable to appreciate the present moment due to being preoccupied with a future ‘beast’ even if it appealing. On the other hand Bonello managed to retain the thematic spine, however, he developed it into a meditation piece that emphasizes the connection and how the fear of vulnerability can manipulate one’s perception of time.

A Universe of Fear and its Pane of Beauty

In terms of visuals, Bonello managed to create a breathtaking time montage. Elegance accompanied with extravagance is bursting in La Belle Époque with the image of candles and lace and gold already being engraved in mind. To envision 2044 in comparison seems otherworldly as it has been stripped bare of all warmth blanketing it in an unsettling beige. 2014 doesn’t seem to help the situation either, as it is settled in an uneasy state of balance between sadness and nostalgia.

Every aspect of these worlds has meaning. Be it a doll factory in Paris or a grim Los Angeles night-club, these mise en scène sends out a similar query: What’s left when everything emotional is taken away? Can the human heart be completely disinfected?

Complex Gift That Richly Delivers

The Beast is not going to attend you and get you the answers that you seek. This piece can leave you befuddled for its first three quarters of an hour paced with the shifting and stitching of timelines. Bonello suggests that the audience goes along with the narrative, that they just bear the disorientation and chaos. Elements of exposition are doled out rather minimally, but there are viewers prepared to hear and the emotional assertion payoffs for them are remarkable.

Breathtaking Gabrielle Comes Alive through Léa Seydoux’s Acting

For the film and very fast paced work gabrielle is played by seydoux and in three different instances and seydoux makes it minimalist. Gabrielle in the Movie Binoche embodies three versions of the same woman, but this woman begins almost July but her nature is human and all it aches for is continuity. Gabrielle, on the other hand, transforms only at a deep level disappearing at the edges and isn’t it opposed and distant as Louis by McKay who begins as an elegant aristocrat and ends as a shabby drifter. And, seyoud adds layers of fragility to the role so that every glance and every pause imbibes the experience and each focal point serves as the missing piece.

Seydoux brilliantly reinforces Gabrielle’s tender yet tragic portrayal regardless of the Era she finds herself in, be it 1910 or a futuristic setting. Gabrielle’s emotional oblivion serves to be her greatest epicenter of heartbreak in Bonello’s world, that overall adds to the brilliance of Seydoux’s performance.

A scaffolding fills a void: Love : Emptiness : The fear of feeling

In the end The beast presents a Teller of a theory: What if we just disable the human body from feeling? The human body is a vessel and it was bound to overflow filled things Gabrielle from cross the time. The reason why such emotion exists is due time, human trips have scribbled the history, the essence of emotion is inevitably rooted deep for loving, grieving, or even fearing something.

What makes the end and the credits so uniquely different to anything else is the question it leaves the audience with. Bonello’s Ideas question what drives us the most: How do you acknowledge things you fear the most while trying to escape those? At the end of the day we all live to feel boned deep emotions in the world that we have been placed in of uncertainty and endless mental fatigue.

  • Imagery suggestions: First look(s) of Gabrielle’s character from the other eras while experiencing the Matrix-like purification machine. Show anti-climactic close up of her blank stare.
  • La Belle Époque: An image of lavish chandeliers gracing a unblemished ground that resonates greatly with a Parisian ballroom and the sound of beauty along with accompanying discomfort.
  • 2014 Los Angeles: An image of a mansion that is cavernous and vacant as Gabrielle strides through, as the definition of luxury which is characterisitc of aloofness.
  • 2044 Future: A room that is utterly beige with sterile blank walls and continuous single flickering which is nothing but sensory overload, ideal for an image of distressing lack of feeling.
  • Final Image: Gabrielle bares a stare towards the physical world as her surroundings morph into nothingness, with vague outlines encapsulating her.

Its hypnotizing quality requires a strong sacrifice in hopes of rewarding its believers with an aftermath they are firmly unlikely to forget, an exploration of sensations unparalleled even if suffering ensues.

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