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Before I went in, I thought this film about a woman who was unhappy with her appearance so took a drug to create a younger, fitter alter ego sounded a bit like The Nutty Professor.

I can tell you now, this movie is not a bit like The Nutty Professor. Don’t take the family.

The story does involve conflict between the two versions of the protagonist, with one paying for the actions of the other, and it has the same Jekyll and Hyde undertones of a person fighting to control their own manifest self destructive urges. Like Robert Louis Stephenson’s famous narrative, it is also a cautionary fable with clear messages around the dangers of desire, regret and vanity, but even with these similarities it is a very different tale and totally its own thing.

This film actually wears its fableistic nature on its sleeve more than any of the many previous adaptations of Stephenson’s classic Victorian novella. While the science of the central transformation is carefully thought out here, and consistent with its own established parameters, this is all very heavy on fantastical and supernatural elements and it’s characters live in a world that has never been real. The setting has aspects that reflect contemporary America but not ones that have ever existed alongside one another; it’s a reflection of reality but highly distorted and regularly incongruous.

In this hyper real set up we meet Elizabeth Sparkles, a once Oscar winning actor who has found new success as a TV fitness instructor but she is more Aphrodite or Medea than Jane Fonda, particularly when she is forcibly aged out and returns to her show in her younger form. In the stylised reality of the film beauty is highly celebrated and misogyny rules, and she becomes surrounded by boorish men and sycophantic admirers who feed her and hook her like a narcotic. Soon temptation leads her to ignore the strict rules that are in place around the management of the titular concoction she is taking to maintain her duel lives, and bad things start to happen.

It is significant that this is probably the first spin on Jekyll and Hyde where both versions have been women. We’ve had lots where it’s been two men and some where one is male and the other female but here the feminine form is absolutely the focus. The female body is absolutely fetishised here, to levels that will be discomforting for many in the audience. It is interesting that in the scenes that feature full nudity there is little titillation as here it is concentrating on body horror and messy rebirth but when Elizabeth, renamed Sue in her younger form, is scantily clad the camera zooms in on her like it’s a soft porn film (or an early 2000s hip hop video – same thing).

Director Coralie Fargeat’s last film Revenge also spent time lingering over the female form but did so in a way that reclaimed it for women and empowered the central character. The Substance does not work toward the same point but there is still parody in how Fargeat shoots these scenes. These are not real bodies, that is the point. They are an idealised, unrealistic and lascivious construct that Elizabeth’s desire for becomes destructive. When you see actor Margaret Qualley’s impossibly spherical breasts, in her leotard and out, they are literally fake, actually being prosthetic attachments. All of this is artificial and it mocks as much as it might satisfy the male gaze. The extreme nature of how the supposedly perfect female form is captured is also key to the contrast with the older versions of this shown on screen. It’s a notion strongly hit home.

The Substance is not a demonstrably feminist movie, certainly not in the way Revenge was, but many of the key messages skew into this arena. The moral here is definitely about the trap of conforming to male wants and the demand this puts on women to meet certain expectations. There is no retribution or redemption here though. There is also something about how the young do not care about their older selves.

The Substance is undeniably a powerful film and it is unfailingly compelling. Qualley and Demi Moore, who plays the original Elizabeth, are both excellent in their respective part. It might be a little unrestrained though. The ending is very full on and quite drawn out. There is some great imagery, I particularly liked one moment involving human eyes, but it might go a bit far in the denouement.

All of this put me in mind of Julia Ducournau’s Titane. Ducournau and Fargeat, both French directors, broke out around the same time with incredible debuts; Revenge for Fargeat and Raw for Ducournau. These movies, released in 2017 and 2016 respectively, were graphic and bold, telling dark stories of violence and female strength. As far as they went though, the content and visuals always served the narrative perfectly. Now each have given us follow ups that push the boundaries to a point that arguably distracts from the stories they are telling. The best scene in The Substance is actually the one that is most grounded, where Moore’s wrestles with her self worth before going out on a date. For me this is where Fargeat is most in control of her storytelling. It is an uncompromising and powerful moment that eclipses any of the grosser parts we see later.

I am thrilled that director’s like Fargeat and Doucournau are realising their vision on film and I am excited that they are women succeeding in an area of the medium that has long been the domain of male filmmakers. It is also great that these movies are finding a mainstream audience in a climate that is saturated with remakes, reboots and sequels. Personally though, I think their work was better with more moderation. The Substance may not be the Nutty Professor but it is unhinged.