Huh..? What a waste of two hours. Spoiler alert.

Rating: 1/10 (16 September 2017)

Where to begin? The actors in this film are all quite accomplished. The Director/Writer, Arnofsky, has multiple large and unusual films to his credit, if not the critical acclaim he undoubtedly thinks is his due. The film tries to be art, but ends up being only artifice. It's full of allegory, and symbolism, but not for dramatic or literary effect. The viewer is beaten over the head with the allegorical inferences until they lie in a bloody pool, like so many of the characters. A better writer might have taken a few weeks to smooth out the more ridiculous moments in the script, or heighten the few suspenseful ones. A better director might have used the house to better elucidate the plodding plot. The man, Javier Bardham, cleverly named "Man" is a poet/writer in an old Victorian house damaged in a fire. He has some sort of writer's block. His wife, Jennifer Lawrence, named "Mother" is doing all the work to repair the house. This is where the film departs from sanity. Two additional characters enter this home, unannounced and unwelcome by "Mother", Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeiffer. Ed is dying of cancer and is a fan of Javier's poetry. Javier's character welcomes them into his home, for "as long as they like" without even consulting his wife. It was at this point I decided that the film was set in some alternate universe where common decency and compassion are unknown. Shortly after that two brothers arrive, the children of Harris and Pfeiffer, and begin to fight over a will, until one finally kills the other in the house. The dying brother is carried out of the house by Bardham's character, supposedly to a nearby hospital. Apparently they have no ambulances in this alternate universe. While Bardham's character is gone tending to the fallen brother, the other brother is still gliding around the house, until finally Jennifer Lawrence, a bit of a neat freak, begins to clean up the blood. Apparently, in this alternate universe there are no crime scene investigators, or detectives, or police. The blood has created a hole in the flooring that drips into the basement, making one wonder if perhaps the Harris family doesn't have something else in common with the Aliens, of the 1979 Ridley Scott film, whose blood is molecular acid, other than their utter lack of empathy. Yes, I know, this is art. It's all symbolic. The film continues for another hour full of blood, murder, and cannibalism, but that's art, right? No, it's not. It's stupid, and voyeuristic, and humorless. Some writers will undoubtedly write that they found laughs in this film, well if they did then they need therapy.