Her Smell

I found Her Smell painfully unwatchable. For most of the film I also couldn't understand what anyone was saying because the sound mixer didn't seem to think that was important. Elisabeth Moss is pretty great, but, like, in service of what? I liked Alex Ross Perry's last Elisabeth Moss movie (Queen of Earth) more than I disliked it, but this one was just not worth it. It's also 145 minutes, for some reason.

Queen of Earth

Alex Ross Perry has made a strangely calibrated film that intends for its genre to be unclear. Is it a mystery? Is it a horror film? What in the hell is going to happen? The reason, I think, the film resists genre is that once we know what genre we're watching, we'll sort of know what to expect. And Perry doesn't want us to know what to expect. This works.

Queen of Earth itself is a critique of white bourgeois entitlement, I guess. But it is also a portrait of sheer madness. Or perhaps it is just that because I value politeness so much, I found the two main characters – and especially Elisabeth Moss's Catherine – absolutely insane. These women are totally unhinged. Who behaves like this??

Also, I love the poster. What a batshit crazy way to sell a movie! You can also see from even the poster that Perry is attempting to avoid the expectations that go along with particular genres. That typeface! That sketch! What am I even looking at??


I can't say that I enjoyed Queen of Earth, but I found all of this thoroughly respectable.