Flux Gourmet

I'm not sure how I got here, probably it being a Peter Strickland film. Who doesn't love that unnerving grainy tone he delivers. This though might push even me a little too far. It's weird. Obviously. The setting is the Sonic Catering Institute. A artistic workspace where a collective have gathered to work with a crank call receiving, pompously controlling, increasingly bizarrely dressed resident director and a somewhat submissive writer, photographer, documentarian with some gastric issues. It's not easy to nail down quite what everyone's purpose is. There's a lot of pretension. A lot of awkwardness. Nobody seems to like one another all that much as they do workshops, endure nightly dinners and sleep in grotty dorms. The collective in residency, made up of Elle, Billy (Asa Butterfield) and Lamina are an art troupe band. Using food as a device for performance art. It's as much about the sound though, with sound sources wired up through vats, pots and blenders, as Elle in the first performance writhes naked in what looks like blood. This is one of the more palatable expressions. I'd like to say it's interesting, well acted. That the narrative is compelling and the characters engaging. None of that is true. What I can say is I like slightly confounding art house indulgence and this ticks that box. It looks good too. Not every frame by any means, but there are several arresting scenes that grab your senses. A Strickland film is rarely an easy watch. He's a director intent on challenge and you'll have to work to enjoy this. If you like something that makes your brain wonder and whirl at what you're watching and why you're watching it though, then Flux Gourmet is worth a taste.

Peter Strickland is a mad man. If you are familiar with his work you'll know what I mean. His nuanced brand of vivid absurdism seems to have a tangible scent and taste to it, where every aspect is designed as sensory overload. This makes him a unique talent despite his overt influences - influences that stretch from giallo art house horror to early Lanthimos (even borrowing one of the Greek auteurs' main players, Ariane Labed for this latest effort). Velvet and satin textures dripping in ebullient color are the fetishistic clues that bring the viewer in on the subtle, often impenetrable themes that are at play. In the case of Flux Gourmet, what is most crucial is the investigation of psychological kinks which stoke the fires for artistic expression. Cronenberg also recently had something to say on the matter, only he used the body as an artistic vessel instead of the mind and its perversions. Though I admire Strickland's wicked little plots, I so frequently notice the fingerprints of others, plastered all over their shells, to where I have trouble appreciating them as original entities. Fortunately, there's always a certain aesthetic and thematic freshness exuding from the cinematography and writing that prevent them from becoming derivative.

A sonic collective who can't decide on a name takes up a residency at an institute devoted to culinary and alimentary performance. The members Elle di Elle (Fatma Mohamed), Billy Rubin (Asa Butterfield) and Lamina Propria (Ariane Labed) are caught up in their own power struggles, only their dysfunctional dynamic is furthermore exacerbated when they've to answer to the institute's head, Jan Stevens (Gwendoline Christie). With the various rivalries unfolding, Stones, the Institute's 'dossierge' has to privately endure increasingly fraught stomach problems whilst documenting the collective's activities. Upon hearing of Stones's visits to the gastroenterologist, Dr Glock (Richard Bremmer), Elle coerces him into her performances in a desperate bid for authenticity. The reluctant Stones (Makis Papadimitriou) uts up with the collective's plans to use his condition for their art whilst Jan Stevens goes to war with Elle over creative differences.

"Flux Gourmet" originally started as a satire on artists and their complex relationship with the institutes that fund their work. To remain neutral and look at both perspectives offering both sympathy and ridicule. Whilst exploring the month-long residency of an art collective that deal with food, the film is interested in the idea of taboo and shock value in art, which in this context opened up the dark side of the stomach and the bowels. This eventually led to the story of a man in the institute suffering from very private and embarrassing stomach problems, the kind of problems many people suffer from, but are sometimes too embarrassed to mention even to a doctor. We've often feel frustrated with cinema's ignorance of allergies and intolerances, which are often portrayed as comedy, particularly when someone's face swells up from anaphylactic shock.

Though there are no allergies or anaphylactic shock in "Flux Gourmet", the film treats stomach problems responsibly, whilst still pushing the boundaries of taste wants to explore coeliac disease for 'Flux Gourmet' and treat all the symptoms methodically. At first, with all the mention of flatulence, the audience might think this is a comedy, but we soon realise that this is serious and we never hear a single fart throughout the film. All the deeply embarrassing problems are never shown. We only hear the character mention them in solemn voice-over, yet there's humour elsewhere with the gender and creative conflicts between band members and the institute. It's clear by the end of the film that having coeliac disease is not the end of the world for the character and people can easily adapt to it, that audiences will understand the disease more instead of thinking it's a 'fad' and thinking a coeliac sufferer won't have any stomach problems if he or she eats gluten.

Also, a lot of emphasis is on the fear prior to diagnosis. The influences for 'Flux Gourmet' are Robert Bresson's films with his solemn and almost religious voice-overs, Rob Reiner's 'Spinal Tap' for the rock n' roll clichés, the Viennese Aktionists for the corporeal shock value and Marcel Marceau for his mime work. The time and place are not specified in order to enhance the film's dream-like nature. Ultimately, through the use of performance art and avant-garde music, the film reveals a very human story about problems that people are often too embarrassed to talk about, but many of us can relate to regardless of how healthy or unhealthy our stomachs are. Within the seriousness, the film also presents a somewhat silly world exploring.creative conflict, rejection, power and the dilemmas facing both artists and their patrons.

Written by Gregory Mann.

Is Flux Gourmet a very dry straight faced joke about pretentious modern art?

Or is it a perfect example of pretentious modern art?

I'm tending towards the latter.

Recommended if you want a movie that takes the idea behind the baked beans scene in Blazing Saddles and stretches it to feature length. Otherwise, if you really must watch a Peter Strickland movie, find The Duke of Burgundy instead.

The oddity of the pace and concept wares off about an hour in and feels like it marches on forever without much of a progress or change. Too much repetition, gags go on far too long & at six cycles with little new to add it feels like a bad sketch that drug on too long.