My thoughts returns to the “love your self :(“ meme as a result of The Substance, together with its success, shares the collective sarcastic exasperation expressed by the meme. Its satire means that the tropey urges to easily love oneself are patronizing, unhelpful, and even dangerous on a number of ranges, which may be boiled all the way down to “you simply don’t understand how it’s.” On one hand, it factors out how accompanying exotifying misdescriptions (e.g., “I heard everybody should get work carried out there”) and prejudiced misunderstandings (e.g., “they only don’t need to look Korean”) hijack the phenomenon from Koreans’ on a regular basis experiences. The advised antidote—i.e., love your self—moreover simplifies the advanced cultural processes right into a easy single-issue matter of appears that may be resolved with an individual-level optimistic outlook. On the opposite, the intercultural “mirrorings” of different nations’ magnificence requirements (e.g., curves, tan) name consideration to the ironic transnational presence and deep-rootedness of equally working norms. That’s, the urges to “love your self” within the absence of a concerted essential societal interrogation of “can” and “how” could solely function exacerbating dismissals. The state of affairs is infuriating as a result of it’s not nearly appears (but it surely form of is simply too), and it’s not simply in regards to the particular person and what they will do about themself (but it surely form of appears to be). It’s maddening as a result of what stands between the particular person and loving themself is not only realizing, however with the ability to survive current as their loving self. ‘What on the earth (and the place) are we purported to do?!’
Equally, The Substance lets out a comically deep sigh. The horrendous story of Elisabeth Sparkle’s self-abuse and fall revolves round her physique(ies). Thus, because the “love your self :(“ trope goes, it might appear that a lot of it may have been prevented with some good outdated realization and self-acceptance, particularly because the movie takes progressively absurdist, “completely f***ing insane” (poster caption) turns. Nevertheless, like how the mesmerizing glittery snowglobe reminds Elisabeth, The Substance’s transfixing spectacles always prod us with the not-so-simple query: what made Elisabeth sparkle—or maybe what made “Elisabeth Sparkle”? Based on Fred, a highschool acquaintance she bumped into, Elisabeth has “not modified a bit” and is “nonetheless probably the most lovely lady in the entire broad world.” We don’t get to know what this implies. We solely get to know Elisabeth Sparkle as a star on the Hollywood Stroll of Fame. We find out about Elisabeth’s abilities and arduous work: her magnificence, her health, her charisma, her wit, her data, her drive, and her life-long routine.
Sue’s instant rise solely additional proves that Elisabeth’s stardom was from who she has been. She is a seasoned confederate. She expertly wields Sue’s drop-dead gorgeousness, together with by way of her “harmless” and wonderful huge smiles regardless of her disgust towards White Males in Energy™, personified by way of the evidently disgusting tv government “Harvey” and his numerous extensions (e.g., youthful male casting administrators) and iterations (e.g., fellow Previous White Males in Go well with caricatures) (additional readings: Andreasen (2022); Durham (2021)). As Sue, she makes perfect-for-late-night-show saucy remarks to distance herself from “outdated” Elisabeth’s irrelevance, associating Elisabeth with Sue’s mother’s—older ladies’s—technology. We study in regards to the “love” that has surrounded Elisabeth. She at present lives alone in a giant, costly penthouse, and seemingly has no shut private relationships. Apart from the employed cleaner who stays obscured within the background, we don’t see anybody in pre-Substance Elisabeth’s condo. After getting fired on her fiftieth birthday, she drinks angrily at an beautiful bar, elegantly dressed however alone. We subsequently see her throwing up and struggling from a hangover by herself at her house. The solely posts Elizabeth appears to have acquired since her pressured retirement are a generic rose bouquet with a generic word from her former job (the precise sort she receives later as Sue earlier than Sue’s huge break/Elisabeth’s true grand retirement), payments, and meals supply fliers (sushi in fact). As Sue, she will get guests: invited lovers (the primary leaves a cute sticky word message in her condo) and an uninvited admirer who covet and search her, whose tenderness rapidly switches to ignore, hostility, and even worry at non-Sue-bodied Elisabeth. The contrasting remedy she experiences at her job equally depicts the love that had surrounded her in her skilled life, culminating within the “tunnel imaginative and prescient” scene towards the top. Now monstrously merged, all “Elisasue” sees by way of the one eyehole of her masks are the flashes of an adoring crowd cheering her as she walks down the lengthy hallway towards her closing stage: “There she is, so lovely!” “We love you!”
Elisabeth is greater than her appears, but it surely had been presumably what enabled Elisabeth to glitter/be Sparkle in her every day {and professional} life. If we will guess from watching the film, she is aware of this even higher from residing and constructing her life as Elisabeth. ‘What on the earth (and the place) is she purported to do now?!’ We should witness all of the absurdity, discomfort, and ache. We’re additionally to witness the youthful glow of Sue. Each the gore and sweetness photographs are extended and descriptive. They resist cleaner, quicker outcome-oriented retelling of Elizabeth’s achievements and abuse and floor her story within the texture and rhythm of her on a regular basis life—the main points that cumulated to experiences after which to life, the moments that she needed to (re)dwell of their time. This invitations the audiences to fill within the jumps, gaps, and inclarities within the film with the main points and moments they’ve lived, and fill in these in their very own narratives with Elizabeth’s life. A robust instance could be the scene the place Elizabeth does and re-does her styling whereas making ready for her date with Fred, who in all probability would have been struck by her in any look. I keep in mind being bodily frozen for a second at her first lavatory mirror reflection. I discovered her and her styling to be so breathtakingly lovely. I beloved the glad little smile that she had. She is nearly to go away however sees the large billboard signal of Sue throughout her window. She hurries again to the toilet. She applies extra make-up and fixes her hair. She is now working out of time however is unable to go away, haunted by Sue. Every time she returns, she covers herself with extra merchandise and objects, and every time, she sparkles much less. I obtained unhappy as a result of I caught myself considering “she appears older now,” a thought that I’ve hurled at myself in entrance of mirrors earlier than. She finally ends up smearing her pink make-up throughout her face as she cries and angrily tries to erase her face. She messes up her hair. She stays at house.
