I gained’t be the primary or final particular person to look at that Infinity Pool is just about The White Lotus with thick dollops of gore, hallucinatory visions, orgiastic sleaze, queasy cloning and state-sanctioned psychosis. If that seems like your factor, dive proper in. Although the household imprimatur continues to be very a lot in proof, writer-director Brandon Cronenberg steps out from the shadow of his father greater than traditional with a sci-fi satire by which wanton violence, depravity and 0 accountability are perks of the rich. Sure to be a gleefully warped thrill journey for some and an disagreeable ordeal for others, it’s not for the squeamish.

Cronenberg’s new movie is much less formally creative and icy than Possessor, extra narratively easy if no much less disturbingly bizarre and grisly. However the go-for-broke extremity lacks the substance to make it greater than an aggressive however shallow provocation. So many motion pictures have needled one-percent privilege lately that sheer shock worth — of which there’s lots right here — doesn’t fairly lower it and not using a contemporary perspective.

There are slight parallels with the 2020 Brazilian Western Bacurau within the lust for blood-sports of amoral First World vacationers. However that epic slab of bleeding pulp was enjoyably subversive, turning the tables with an underclass rebel. Cynically permitting the wealthy barbarians to maintain doing what they do exactly feels unadventurous at this level.

What Infinity Pool does have going for it, nonetheless, is one other ferociously dedicated efficiency from Alexander Skarsgård to comply with The Northman and but extra lip-smacking villainy and sexual mayhem from Mia Goth, taking part in one other horror hellcat on high of final yr’s Ti West double-bill, X and Pearl. These stars, together with the Cronenberg devoted, ought to assist Neon entice style followers hungry for a perverse freakout, exploding with macabre photos.

Skarsgård performs writer James Foster, whose first e-book was neither an enormous vendor nor a important success; he’s been struggling to generate a follow-up within the six years since. Fortunately, he married cash, with publishing connections as well.

James and his youthful spouse Em (Cleopatra Coleman) have come to a luxurious seashore resort on the fictional island of Li Tolqa within the hope that he’ll climb out of his non secular funk and discover inspiration. However indicators shortly point out this might be no breezy getaway, as DP Karim Hussain warps the picture in a 360-degree rotation whereas they’re heading to breakfast and indigenous locals on bikes tear up the sand to scare the well-heeled vacationers.

One other resort visitor, industrial actress Gabi Bauer (Goth), sidles as much as James on the seashore and begins chatting, confessing that she acknowledged him and is an enormous fan of his novel. Extremely vulnerable to flattery, James begins spending time with Gabi and her Swiss architect husband Alban (Jalil Lespert), regardless that Em appears much less eager. The insidious digicam angles, the menacing slo-mo and woozy music throughout an evening out on the town counsel the Bauers will not be good of us. However we knew that as quickly as Mia Goth confirmed up.

Whereas the resort administration stresses that going past the barbed-wire compound perimeter is harmful, the Bauers are persuasive the subsequent day after they insist that James and Em be a part of them for a picnic at a distant swimming spot. Alban makes unsavory jokes over the barbecue lunch, however all the things appears comparatively regular. That’s till James slips away to pee and Gabi seems out of nowhere to supply hand reduction, which Cronenberg reveals in graphic element, proper all the way down to the (presumably) prosthetic erection and cash shot on the pebbles.

James is jittery and silent for the remainder of the day, and whereas he’s behind the wheel of the Bauers’ borrowed sportscar heading again to the resort, he hits and kills a neighborhood, which the subsequent day lands each the Fosters in jail. What occurs afterwards is haute Cronenberg mindfuckery, so now’s the time to cease studying for those who’re averse to spoilers.

The sinister detective in cost, Thresh (Thomas Krestchmann), informs James {that a} critical crime like a success and run beneath native regulation comes with a extreme penalty — execution by a toddler of the deceased. However the Li Tolqa officers have a particular deal for moneyed international vacationers convicted of crimes. For a hefty value, they’ve the expertise to make excellent clones of them, full with their reminiscences.

Cronenberg makes the cloning course of the primary of many mind-bending interludes, with a group of terse girls in lab coats poking and prodding James for measurements earlier than he’s locked in a glass chamber stuffed with purple goop and a strobe does a quantity on his head whereas the surrogate is being baked.

Solely as soon as the clone is prepared are James and Em knowledgeable that their presence is required to witness the execution. Non-negotiable. Compelled to look at whereas her husband’s double is viciously stabbed to loss of life by a 9-year-old boy, Em is traumatized. However James watches the whole ugly spectacle like a robotic, the faintest hint of a smile crossing his face when it’s over.

That violent killing is the primary of many as soon as James discovers he’s now a part of an unique membership, together with the Bauers and different posh creeps, all of them skilled in surrogate executions. “We’re all zombies right here,” certainly one of them laughs, teasingly planting the suggestion that maybe the true James was killed, not the faux.

This secret society reunites yearly in La Tolqa, goading each other to commit increasingly grotesque violence whereas carrying the locals’ grotesque ceremonial flesh masks, protected within the information that they’ll pay up after they’re arrested and watch the juicy spectacle of their clones being slaughtered. The executions are a part of the enjoyable. It doesn’t take a lot to lure empty shell James into the sicko video games, with assist from a hallucinogenic native root drug and a few sexual encouragement, first from Gabi then the entire gang.

All this offers Cronenberg with a canvas to discover some very on-brand physique horror, to get his actors moist and sticky with physique fluids and viscera, and to stage trippy out-of-body experiences with weird visions of genital mutations amid the flickering psychedelia, accompanied by Tim Hecker’s malevolent synth rating.

James is steadily seduced to the darkish aspect, inspired to throw off his inhibitions and present the native “animals” his dominance. However initiation into the membership proves not so easy. When he resists and tries to slide away, the diabolically amusing Gabi leads the cost to drag him again into line. The movie’s title clues us in to his destiny.

Watching limitless executions of himself on a loop or beating a hooded determine to a gristly pulp earlier than discovering it’s his double seems to be not James’ concept of enjoyable in any case. However because the film lurches deeper and deeper into repetitive torture-porn mode, it may not be yours both.

The thought of the decadent wealthy getting their kicks by brutalizing the indigenous individuals of a poor nation and getting away with it is likely to be archly satirical. However in Cronenberg’s script — which is stronger on nightmarish visuals than engrossing plot element — it’s additionally a bit facile.

There are moments of depraved humor, like Gabi studying aloud a scathing assessment of James’ novel, which appears virtually extra agonizing for him than all the remainder of the carnage. However until you get off on watching a model of Alexander Skarsgård bare and led round on all fours by a canine collar (OK, who doesn’t?), or pummeling his doppelganger to mincemeat, or sucking on the blood-smeared breast of Gabi like some form of unholy Pietà, all of it begins to turn out to be laughable, the shock giving technique to numbness.

That’s to not say Skarsgård isn’t riveting as he goes from abject terror to desperation to chilly, smug ruthlessness and again once more. Or that Goth doesn’t add one other memorable horny monster to her gallery of dangerously unhinged girls. However none of that masks the truth that Cronenberg sells himself as a purveyor of difficult mental horror, and Infinity Pool is psychologically skinny gruel. It’s immersive and unsettling for those who go together with it, however foolish for those who give it a lot thought.