The One I Love

[osprey_archer]

I have been trying to broaden my movie-watching tastes a bit, as I periodically do, and in the service of this project I watched The One I Love, which is a cheerful sunlit horror movie. No gore, no jump scares, just an unhappily married couple going away to a charming isolated house in the California wine country. The property has a main house and a guest house, and in the guest house, they each meet their spouse's doppelganger.

Or rather, they each meet a more easy-going, open, whatever-you-want-honey version of their spouse. Ethan is appalled; Sophie, on the other hand, is intrigued, and suggests that they should stay at the house to explore this interesting phenomenon. "DON'T DO IT" I screamed at the screen, as they discussed ground rules for this experiment. But of course they didn't listen.

The story is quite unlike anything I've seen, and I've been thinking about it on and off since watching it. But the style in which it's told very much screams "indie movie" - and it's interesting, I think, that indie movies end up having a house style just as much as Hollywood; they're for people who want something different, but it ends up often being the same kind of different.

The One I Love has the strengths of the indie style: the self-consciously beautiful cinematography; the willingness to give the characters room to be strange and complicated - but also the weaknesses, in spades. In particular, the movie seems absolutely petrified of explaining anything. Part of the horror arises from the fact that the characters barely understand what's going on, and have no way to find out, but it also feels a little like cheating.

In particular, the refusal to explain makes the ending seem rushed: they want to end on a moment of uncertainty and horror, but it's not quite uncertain enough to be horrifying.

Comments

[evelyn-b.livejournal.com]

Oh my goodness. That premise sounds like more DNW than I can handle, even in summary.

*shudder*

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

It's nightmarish in a very understated way. Someone else who is just like me, but better in every way! (Although it becomes clearer as the movie goes on that the doppelgangers aren't "just like the originals but better" - they actually seem quite different.)

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I'm actually intrigued (especially given your comment to evelyn-b), except it sounds as if there's no clear resolution.

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

I actually think the resolution is fairly clear; it's just not quite satisfying. But I think this might be one of those movies where the journey is worthwhile even if it doesn't quite get where it wants to go.

[artemis_wandering]

This sounds interesting enough despite its flaws for me to add it to my list. Thanks! (Also, would never have gotten any of this from its Netflix summary.)

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

Netflix summaries are sometimes weirdly off the mark. I forget what movie I saw - something Bollywood - but the summary seemed barely related to what the movie was actually about.