Poor Things and The Favourite filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos is no stranger to tonally striking, thematically obtuse pictures. Kinds of Kindness finds him heavy on the craziness and, unfortunately, light on the engagement.
Personally, I find metaphor and allegory-heavy films have a few more steps to take in order to grab me. Keeping us at arm’s length regarding meaning is fine, if you engage on emotional, visceral, narrative levels that drive our desire to dig further. For me, it wasn’t much more than a shallow exercise.
The three loosely connected stories here all have interesting elements, but they unfold in lethargic ways. The film’s peculiar look at the pitfalls of fixation, whether they be in relationships or cult dogmas, do provide some grimly sardonic, proudly bizarre, surprising moments, but they don’t add up to the momentum as they should, particularly with a runtime of 2 hours 44 minutes.
The key plus here is the cast. Strong performances from Jesse Plemons, Emma Stone and Willem Dafoe.
Kinds of Kindness is not a film for all audiences – nor does it want to be. It wasn’t for me.
