This story contains heavy spoilers for the entirety of The Substance. In Coralie Fargeat’s new feminist horror movie The Substance, harmful societal beauty standards are the real monsters. They (female objectification, the disposal of “the old,” the proliferation of an industry built on body modification) feed a beast of a cycle that leads Demi Moore’s fading TV personality character Elisabeth Sparkle to seek out a black market treatment called The Substance that promises to make her more beautiful. And in doing so, she undergoes a creature-feature-like transformation herself.
The Substance is a grotesque process—one involving syringes, fluids, and Elisabeth’s spine opening up to birth a younger double played by Margaret Qualley. Elisabeth and her counterpart, known as Sue, cannot be conscious simultaneously, so they each live for a week before switching places, with Sue detracting liquid from a gaping hole in Elisbeth’s spine to sustain herself. When Sue abuses The Substance, Elisabeth begins to age—starting with one unnerving, decrepit finger before spreading into creaky, nearly unusable limbs; and when Elisabeth fights back by binge-eating, Sue malfunctions so much so that she can pull chicken wings out of her navel.
