Film: “Kinds of Kindness” directed by Yorgos Lanthimos

There are two kinds of filmgoers in the world: those who are so revolted by a Yorgos Lanthimos movie that they walk out in the first 15 minutes, and those who stick around to see what this madman filmmaker is up to. Chances are, if you enjoyed his award-winning “Poor Things” starring Emma Stone, you may also love his latest creation, “Kinds of Kindness.” But all bets are off.

“Kindness” is actually an anthology of three different films, each having much of the same cast but playing different roles. In the first film, Robert (a slimmed down Jesse Plemons) is a submissive middle manager who lets his boss Raymond (Willem Dafoe) dictate what Robert will drive, how he will dress, even what time of day he will make love to his wife. He also orders Robert to crash his car at high speed into a blue BMW driven by another employee (Yorgos Stefanakos). When Robert protests, he faces consequences.

In Film 2, Plemons plays Daniel, a cop who is distraught that Liz, his marine biologist wife (Emma Stone), is lost at sea. When she miraculously returns and starts behaving out of character, Daniel suspects the woman is not really his wife. This drives him so crazy he is put on medication by a psychiatrist (Nathan Mulligan). Daniel begins to test the woman’s loyalty, by asking her to do unconscionable things.

In the last film, perhaps the most fleshed out of the three, Stone roars onto the screen driving a purple Dodge Challenger. As Emily, a member of a cult led by Omi (Dafoe), she is tasked with tracking down an individual (Margaret Qualley from “Maid”) who the cult believes may have Christ-like powers. Omi is the sort of cult leader who forbids his disciples to drink or otherwise expose themselves to “contaminating fluids.” If they disobey, they will be cast from Omi’s Garden of Eden, which looks strangely like Southern California.

The underlying theme of all three films seems to be that loyalty, good or bad, has consequences—whether it’s loyalty to a boss, to a deranged husband, or to a whacked-out cult leader. No value judgements here.

The eeriness of the film—half “Twilight Zone”, half David Lynch—is magnified by composer Jerskin Fendrix’s use of discordant piano and stress-inducing choirs.

It should be clear by now that not everyone will “get” the film. That’s understandable. “Kindness‘s” audacity, bizarro sense of humor and often gratuitous moments of violence make “Poor Things” look mainstream by comparison. But if you stick it out till the end (the movie’s just short of three hours long), you’ll recoil, giggle, and once the lights go up, never stop talking or thinking about it. Enjoy.

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