Within the first few minutes of Christos Nikou’s sci-fi-inflected satire Fingernails, in which a medical test has been devised to determine whether two subjects are truly in love, viewers will probably ask themselves why anyone would trust the readout of a machine over their own heart. The only feasible motivation presented in the film is that it helps predict the likelihood of divorce in future – but why throw away a good relationship just because a microwave attached to a vintage TV set said so? Rational audiences will quickly conclude that we can’t do better than to follow the nudges of our desires, and pay the magic love science – how does one measure love, anyway? – about as much mind as we would a compatibility quiz in the back of a magazine. And yet it takes the characters in this misbegotten speculative thought experiment nearly two hours to figure that out and notice the gaping hole in the middle of a paper-thin premise.
Nikou, formerly an assistant director to his Greek countryman Yorgos Lanthimos, makes his English-language debut in much the same way as his mentor did, with a conceptual amendment to the laws of attraction. But where Lanthimos’ film The Lobster brought a mordant non-realism to a take-no-prisoners spin on dating, this film takes a more pedestrian approach to relationship insecurity, with one quirky hook. Following the sadistically comical lines laid down by Lanthimos, Fingernails’ storyline requires that all test participants allow an administrator to rip off a nail with a pair of pliers. Even that has a literal-minded stupidity to it: an opening title card states that malfunctions of the heart first manifest as symptoms in the fingernails, and in a moment of desperation, one woman becomes convinced that they are the source of her anxiety, that stubbier digits will erase her problems.
That would be Anna (Jessie Buckley, her acting standard of excellence softening the moronic decisions her character keeps making), a former teacher now working at the Love Institute founded by the earnest, idealistic Duncan (Luke Wilson). At home, she lies about her new job to her boyfriend Ryan (Jeremy Allen White), whose beefy forearms and Siberian-husky baby blues can only do so much to make up for his lack of sexual interest in her and his fondness for the dullest documentaries ever made. Her eye lands on her sensitive coworker Amir (Riz Ahmed); their comfortable banter soon solidifies into the office closeness that weds work-wife to work-husband. As they coach couples to foster intimacy in preparation for the big exam (the funniest method being a Pavlovian shock administered whenever your partner leaves the house, so as to condition you into missing them while they’re away), Anna starts to wonder whether she could have it better.
There’s a pearl of wisdom buried under a layer of bivalve mucus in here – namely, that love must be actively maintained and will wither if taken for granted. Anna does not seem particularly invested in working on her relationship with Ryan, never asking him to be more present or communicating that she has no interest in spending 90 minutes learning about rivers. She seems to want to blow up her life. It’s a tendency to self-destructive bad behaviour with which Nikou could really do something, but he’s got a sentimental streak that holds him back from putting the screws to his characters. In The Lobster, courtship was a fascistic, compulsory series of rituals and challenges, but Fingernails depicts a recognisable romance not far from the everyday.
Perhaps that’s unavoidable, since the natural chemistry between two stars of Buckley and Ahmed’s calibre would be tough to tamp down. Buckley in particular can seemingly do no wrong; when she quietly sings Yazoo’s Only You at her desk, the audience can see everything Amir sees in her. But the evasive, guarded acting from the main players can only do so much to elevate the paltry material Nikou gives them to work with. A long, fitfully amusing walk down a short road.
Fingernails premieres on Apple TV+ on 3 November
