Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: High-Rise (2015) - Wheatley gets lost in strange societal critique adaptation

3/21/2023

High-Rise (2015) - Wheatley gets lost in strange societal critique adaptation

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Glamorous stars assemble on this kaleidoscopic poster for Ben Wheatley's High-Rise

A new resident in a 1970s high-rise attempts to find his place in its closed, class-divided inner society.

High-Rise is written by Amy Jump (A Field in England (2013)), adapting High Rise (1975) by J.G. Ballard (The Burning World (1964)), and directed by great English filmmaker Ben Wheatley (Down Terrace (2009)).

The film feels like the fevered deliriums of a deranged Brit about 1970s class society and its people. The pace is strangely uneasy, rushed from the get-go, but this is no great narrative that sets an agenda.

For periods the strange film is nightmarish, but more often it is just remote and unengaging as it tumbles along and feels oddly archaic, as if what 40 years ago was a terse work is now - here - for inscrutable reasons staged in its original 1970s period, but completely without context. The unreality is mixed with a feeling of pretentious indulgence, when the characters of the almost incomprehensible film continue to abide in violence and smoking in ridiculous numbers of shots. Not unlike the recent Filth (2013), High-Rise is a late adaptation of an English work of dark and acerbic grain, which loses millions as a commercial product in itself and is a solid bummer.

A Field in England (2013) or, Shit and Thistles

Top 10: Best drama-thrillers reviewed by Film Excess to date
Kill List (2011) - Wheatley's jaw-breaking, great genre-mixer

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 6.1 mil. £, approximately 8 mil. $

Box office: 5.3 mil. $

= Huge flop (returned 0.66 times its cost)

[High-Rise premiered 13 September (Toronto International Film Festival) and runs 119 minutes. Shooting took place from June - August (2014) in Northern Ireland, including in Belfast. The film opened #39 to a 79k $ first weekend in 79 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #37 and never grew in theater count, grossing 346k $ (6.5 % of the total gross). The film's biggest markets were the UK with 2.8 mil. $ (52.8 %), Portugal with 1 mil. $ (18.9 %) and Russia with 645k $ (12.2 %). Wheatley returned with Free Fire (2016). Tom Hiddleston (Thor: Ragnarok (2017)) returned in Crimson Peak (2015). High-Rise is fresh at 60 % with a 6.50/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of High-Rise?

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

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Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

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Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

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Philip Baker Hall has died

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Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!

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3/21/2023

High-Rise (2015) - Wheatley gets lost in strange societal critique adaptation

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Eagerly anticipating this week ... (16-24)

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