British filmmaker Peter Strickland makes distinctive cinema that awakens the senses — sometimes in unpleasant ways. His arthouse hit, "The Duke of Burgundy," about lesbian S&M lepidopterists, had a perfume credit. His thriller "In Fabric" featured a killer dress (don't put it in the wash!) His recent stop-motion short, "GUO4," had two naked guys fighting in a locker room that still made viewers feel every blow. These films are good preparation for Strickland's latest accomplishment, "Flux Gourmet" about a sonic catering collective's (yes, it's a thing), residency at an elite institute run by Jan Stevens (Gwendoline Christie of "Game of Thrones").
The collective consists of Elle (Fatma Mohamed), Billy (Asa Butterfield), and Lamina (Ariane Labed), who do performance art involving food sounds. In one set piece, Elle is naked and covered in blood, rolling around on the floor as cooking noises are played along with droning music. One scatalogical work features a voiceover track about a man being excited by a woman using the toilet, as Elle smears her body with what appears to be feces. (Viewers will likely keep repeating the mantra, "That is chocolate pudding.")
