A Cure for Wellness (2017)

I remember watching the trailer for this film when it first came out and decided not to read or watch anything to do with it until I actually go and see. And thankfully I pretty much went in blind bar the synopsis and had no spoilers. A Cure for Wellness is based around Dane DeHaan’s character travelling to Switzerland to retrieve a follow wall street business man from a spa retreat. Unfortunate circumstances mean he’s struck not just trying to figure out how to find his colleague, but how to escape from the spa himself.

Now I like Dane DeHaan, I think he’s got an interesting face and a good career ahead of him. I liked him a lot in Chronicle (2012) and he’s done well since. He’s quite a serious chap isn’t he? Very intense little man. His characters always have a severity to them. In this he begins unlikable, though handles the weight of the cliched rude yet successful business man suited to older men well. His character Mr Lockhart doesn’t really have a great development or progression, he doesn’t really become a different person until pretty much the last 30 seconds of the film. Not due to DeHaan, who is very believable in his struggles and frustrations, and his eagerness to understand seems genuine. But more due to the amount of story. So we’ve got a few different subplots all weaving together. So on our way to try and retrieve his colleague, Pembrooke, our first subplot, we’re told a little about the history of the retreat and it’s relationship with the village. On this journey we also touch on Lockhart’s father, who we come back to further on in the movie. Then once there we meet a young woman named Hannah who is a special patient in this ‘Wellness Centre’. As the film goes on water is a big theme too, don’t make my mistake and watch the movie thirsty, damn. So we’ve got Pembrooke, history, daddy Lockhart, Hannah and water. Now it’s not that it’s overpowering but it’s that it’s kind of underpowering. We gather that they’re gonna be related but often they get treated as individual narratives. I get it, you don’t want to tell us the ending you want us to try and guess and be surprised. That’s all well and good but on occasion you kinda forget about the others, then when they come back up, you’re like, oh, oh yeah are we still meant to care about that? Oh Lockhart cares still so yeah I guess we should. The rest of the cast is good, well suited, Mia Goth playing Hannah was great, she’s got a list, albeit short, but a good list of interesting roles. Jason Isaacs was great, creepy and powerful, if you’re wondering why you recognise his sparkly blues it’s because he played Lucius Malfoy.

Let’s talk about the pretty pictures. So the cinematographer for this is Bojan Bazelli, now I wouldn’t personally say that he’s got a particular style of his own, he adapts to whats needed for the picture. Examples of his work go from The Ring (2002) to Hairspray (2007) so I was open minded on what was matching the director Gore Verbinksi, who also directed The Ring. The brief showing of the office world is as expected with dull muted colours, but once with get to the Swiss Alps and the wellness centre some colours get sparingly included. It’s a gorgeous place to shot and the old architecture is beautiful, it finds its way onto the screen as would a Grimm’s fairy tale. With the aforementioned theme of water we get a lot of blues and greys along with the medical whites. The opening monologue to the film discusses how humans are the only creatures capable of self reflection so that does become a motif, in water, glass and of course mirrors. Another frequent visual is explicit framing, doors, windows archways, you name it and DeHaan stood in the middle of it. I also really enjoyed the sound, Benjamin Wallfisch has a wide selection of films under his belt, many of which have emotive sound and music. Having Lockhart use a crutch for a majority of the film is almost reminiscent to Rear Window in having the protagonist be physically bound by something, it adds danger. And to be perfectly honest with out that I doubt the film would have the same sense of suspense.

One thing I really want to discuss is the certificate of the film. Before literally being at the counter buying the tickets I did not know this was going to be an 18, but it was. Why? I don’t know. Maybe I’m a harden adult and didn’t think there was much that counts as higher than a 15. Granted it’s probably the collection of things. I won’t reveal anything that is countered to the plot but there is a rather adult scene, which though uncomfortable, isn't explicit. There is nudity, but it’s a spa, so yeah there’s some naked people trotting around. Language, yes but not enough to notice. Violence, yes, though not a great deal. If you don’t like the dentist, you won’t like a scene in the film. If you are scared of water you’re gonna feel a bit claustrophobic in parts. If you aren’t a fan of eels or leeches, this film isn’t going to convince you otherwise. The small parts of which where special effects were used they were fantastic.

Overall a somewhat engaging film though slow pacing, if you’ve got 2 hours and are curious, go right ahead. 6/10. Didn’t have the confidence to be completely experimental but had interesting elements.