Review by Eric Hillis
Directed by: Karim Aїnouz
Starring: Callum Turner, Riley Keough, Elle Fanning, Jamie Bell, Tracy Letts, Lukas Gage, Pamela Anderson
Rosebush Pruning is a collaboration between the Brazilian director Karim Aïnouz (The Invisible Life of Euridice Gusmao; Motel Destino) and Greek screenwriter Efthimis Filippou. Save for some striking use of colour, there is little to identify it as the work of the former, but it bears similarities to the latter's collaborations with Yorgos Lanthimos. It is a remake of an Italian film - Marco Bellochio's 1965 satire Fists in the Pocket - that has been put through a Greek Weird Wave filter.
The basic setup of Bellochio's film - a young man conspiring to murder his family members - is all that remains. The family here are the Taylors, a wealthy American tribe who have relocated to Spain. Recently the Taylor matriarch (Pamela Anderson) passed away after being savaged by wolves, leaving behind her blind husband (Tracy Letts) and their adult children Ed (Callum Turner), Anna (Riley Keough), Jack (Jamie Bell) and Robert (Lukas Gage).
The narrative centres itself on Ed, an empty-headed fashionista who recently befriended an older man yet doesn't seem to recognise that the feelings he holds for him are clearly homosexual in nature. Ed narrates the movie, often dropping self-invented catchphrases, one of which is "People are like roses. Families are like rosebushes. And rosebushes need pruning." Seeing how awful his family are towards Jack's new girlfriend Martha (Elle Fanning), Ed decides to "prune" them so Jack can be set free.
Rosebush Pruning plays like Kind Hearts and Coronets as reimagined by some insufferable European edgelord. There are none of the fleshed out characters and believable relationship dynamics that usually populate the films of Aïnouz. There is however plenty of the absurdism associated with Filippou, but it plays like a lazy parody of the sort of movies he has written with or for Lanthimos. It has nothing to say beyond "aren't rich people weirdos" and is constantly poking the audience with a stick in a desperate attempt to provoke cheap revulsion. "Look at these weirdos," it keeps begging, "aren't they gross?"
The Taylors are indeed gross, so much so that it's a chore to spend time in their presence. As a satire there just aren't enough laughs. Most of the film's lazy provocations are based around the family members' incestual feelings and actions towards each other. I don't believe any subject is out of bounds for comedy, but if you want to generate laughs from incestuous abuse you need to try a lot harder than Rosebush Pruning, a film which seems to believe merely mentioning a taboo subject is enough to get a rise from the viewer.
The muddled plot is difficult to swallow, with Ed's motivations unclear throughout, and it's impossible to care whether he pulls off his murderous plan or not. The only character of any interest is Fanning's Martha, who presents herself as a delicate naif but who is clearly a manipulative gold digger intent on marrying into the Taylors' wealth. It is amusing that she is willing to put up with the Taylors' despicable behaviour towards her, and the movie might have been far more satisfying if it was about a family who find it impossible to turn away an interloper because she is just as morally bankrupt as themselves rather than the tiresome murder plot.
Lord knows what they saw in the script, but the starry cast are all on their A-games here, with Keough a particular standout as the vampy Anna, an undeniably seductive sociopath of the sort usually found trying to strangle James Bond between their thighs. While the plot never engages, there is at least always something interesting to look at here, with garish production design straight out of a '70s giallo thriller, arresting costumes and the dazzling cinematography of Hélène Louvart. But all this talent is in service of a movie that is as thematically vacuous as the wealthy weirdos it seeks to satirise.
Rosebush Pruning is in UK/ROI cinemas from July 10th.
