Towering Inferno

I want to thank the Ferdy on Films blog for introducing me to High-Rise (2016). It’s a funny dystopian horror film based on a J.G. Ballard story. Ms. Spenser liked it because it stars Tom Hiddlestone.

Hiddleston lives in a just-built apartment tower in 1970s England. It is quite brutalist - all raw concrete - and rather suits him, a somewhat severe, withdrawn young man. His upstairs neighbor, Siena Miller, sees him sunbathing and invites him to a party, where he meets some of the dwellers on the other floors. There are a lot of women and children, who live on the lower floors, for convenience. There's an insecure older movie star. There’s laddish, Alan Bayesian Luke Evans, who tries to seduce every woman he comes close to. Hiddleston offers a bottle of wine to the hostess, and murmurs: "I'm not good at fitting in in these kinds of things." But he seems to be fitting in quite well, getting to bed Miller a little later.

He also gets to meet the architect of the building, Royal (Jeremy Irons). He is taken up to the penthouse by a thuggish underling. There's a garden up there, and a little English cottage, and the missus keeps a horse. Later, he attends their party, and everyone is inexplicably dressed in Louis XIV finery. Although Royal talks about the mixture of classes living in the tower, it's clear who belongs to which level.

As the building's shoddy construction becomes apparent, lifts stop working, lights go off, and the stores aren't being stocked anymore. Fights break out over little things, and Hiddleston kind of likes it - it brings something out in him. And even as the microcosm of the tower is breaking down, Hiddleston still goes to work everyday - they are not cut off from the outside world. There are parties in the halls now, lit by fires or torches. The parties on the lower floors are earthier, the ones higher up more decadent, but there is the feeling that this is the way we live now.

This is all done with the lightest touch of 70s period setting. Hiddleston seems very at home in the milieu - I feel like there is a little Jeremy Irons in his choices, but maybe I'm just suggestive. I haven't read the J.G. Ballard story this is based on, but it seems very Ballardian.

In conclusion, it was directed by Ben Wheatley, a newish director who seems to specialize in low-budget, high-gloss, high-concept violent movies. I wonder if I would like any of the others.