EDDINGTON

Ari Aster’s latest offering is set in the fictional New Mexico town of Eddington, population 2500, during the COVID semi-lockdown of May 2020. It’s a time of heightened political and social division. Local mayor Ted Garcia (Pedro Pascal) supports a major tech company building a data centre nearby. He gets into a power struggle over his position with Sheriff Joe Cross (Joaquin Phoenix) who opposes the mask mandate and is obsessed with usurping Garcia. Meanwhile Cross’s reclusive wife Louise (Emma Stone) becomes engrossed in online conspiracy theories. Stone feels under-utilised in the role. When locals begin participating in black lives matter protests, chaos arrives and the plot spirals off into several different directions. Phoenix gets the most screen time and this is his maturest role yet. He portrays Cross superbly in his literal “falling down” era, where things keep going from bad to worse. Sharp and loud music assaults your ears when the action gets tense, cleverly contrasting with the quiet, barren landscape of Eddington. The first hour is slow to build and at one point I wondered if the end would ever come. When it finally did, my brain hurt from processing all of the elements that unfolded. This is a film you’ll either love or hate – but either way, it’s unlike anything you’ll expect.