Have You Been Watching...? Vivarium (2019)

 

Sometimes a movie comes along, and you hear the buzz (or lack of) and you make a conscious decision that this isn’t something you would want to see.  I’d heard of Vivarium when it first came out. The premise intrigued me, but it’s low budget and cast didn’t appeal to me, so I decided I would give it a miss.

Fast forward a couple of years when there’s nothing on the telly but Vivarium comes up on my suggested watches list. Well, in the absence of anything better, I pressed play and got ready for disappointment. Most movies these days have great ideas, then lose the plot as they move on.

Vivarium didn’t just exceed my expectations, it is a truly brilliant piece of work. Is it a horror story? Is it science fiction? Is it a warning? Who knows, there is so much to unpack in this movie and its tiny cast (number-wise, not in stature) doesn’t detract from the nightmare.

What’s it about, then? Tom and Gemma, a bright, happily-in-love young couple played by Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network, Zombieland, Now You See Me) and Imogen Poots (28 Weeks Later and new Amazon series Outer Range) decide to buy their first home together on a large, sprawling modern new-build estate. After being brought to the property by creepy salesman Martin (played by Jonathan Aris (The World’s End, The Martian), they find themselves alone after Martin disappears. Despite numerous attempts to leave, they keep finding their way back to the house.

It's going to be difficult to talk about the film without mentioning what happens in it. So, MILD SPOILERS AHEAD….

Things go from bad to worse when a box appears outside, with a baby in it. The instructions left with the baby suggest if they raise it, they will be released. The nightmare then continues to get worse.

Is it worth spending you time on? Absolutely, yes. What appears to be an extended episode of The Twilight Zone or such, turns into an eerie and downright bizarre affair. What I initially thought would be negatives actually turn into positives for this movie. It’s low budget and sets help maintain that eeriness. The estate looks like something out of a pop video, and it’s even mentioned in dialogue when characters discuss the clouds looking like “clouds”.  There is no imagination here. Everything does what it is supposed to do. The clearly unreal reality works in the movie’s favour.

Do we get answers? Not really. The movie’s main message appears to be joining in the expectations of society: a dream home, coupled bliss, having a child, become the epitome of the destruction of individuality, and a person’s worst nightmare is becoming a parent and homeowner!  The child develops throughout the movie, and becomes addicted to television, but in this case a surreal display of imagery and symbols that could be an alien language. Gemma and Tom do try to break out of their habitat several times, to their cost.

The ending of the movie throws up even more questions that ultimately remain unanswered. Usually this would have me yelling at the TV and thinking that they writers couldn’t find a way to resolve the story, but it WORKS here. Knowing less about what is going on seems to make this movie work better. Tom and Gemma don’t know, we don’t know and the only people who do know are the protagonists, whom we don’t even get to meet beyond “Martin” (and his final scene is nothing short of shocking!)

Vivarium is a good movie. Maybe not one to choose if you want a bubblegum movie, but if you want something to give you food for thought and is a little disconcerting, you’d do a lot worse than go for this one.

Year – 2019

Availability – Amazon Prime (at time of writing. Various language and subtitle options)

HYBW movie rating – 7/10