High-Rise is the latest film adaption of a J.G. Ballard novel. The previously most prominent one was David Cronenberg's controversial Crash (1996). Similar to that one, High-Rise is a pretty faithful adaption of the material. Having read both of those books, I felt that High-Rise was definitely the superior of the two. It was a perfect example of the peculiar kind of sci-fi Ballard is known for, i.e. it's nihilistic, critical of society and the set-up is very familiar but with some slight changes, which gives off the feeling that the events are set five minutes in the future. This film adaption is a little different to this in that the stylistic decision has been made that the world in which events take place would resemble the one envisaged by Ballard back in 1975 when he wrote the novel, i.e. it's a view of the future mid-70's style in all its beige and concrete glory. The upshot of this is that the look is of the retro-future variety and this may be the single best thing about the film overall. The photography and set-design are both excellent, while the various montages and dream-like segments are all very well executed. To top this off is a very well chosen soundtrack, which often has a sound which fits the sterile surroundings very well, as well as two very different and interesting versions of the ABBA song S.O.S., a song which also came out the same year this novel was released.
The story in a nutshell has a doctor move into a modern high-rise building which has been fitted with all mod cons, meaning that life can be lived within its confines without the need to leave the building. The skyscraper has an in-built social order, where the higher your apartment is, the higher you are in the caste system. This leads to resentment from the people in the lower floors who feel they are getting a bad deal out of the system. This leads to a violent class war, where the residents are reduced to savagery in an alarmingly short space of time.
The high-rise itself serves as a microcosm of human capitalist society as a whole. The events and character actions that occur are of course highly exaggerated and severe, even if they do touch upon definite truths. But this is a very blackly satirical story and so realism is not a priority here. To this end the events are often wilfully surreal and absurd. This approach does mean, however, that this is not always a fully engaging experience, with many vignettes going off at tangents and the abundant humour sometimes meaning it is hard to take things altogether seriously some of the time. It's a quite fragmented film overall, with a not entirely linear story-line and the full-on nature of the visual presentation – while extremely good – can sometimes overcome the content. Still, I found a lot to like in this one and admired the boldness of approach. Director Ben Wheatley has to be given appropriate credit for bringing this to the screen in such an uncompromising manner, he is certainly putting together one of the most interesting bodies of work in cinema right now. Ultimately, High-Rise is certainly a film that will understandably be very divisive, but I thought, on the whole, it was a very good adaption of an excellent subversive novel.
The story in a nutshell has a doctor move into a modern high-rise building which has been fitted with all mod cons, meaning that life can be lived within its confines without the need to leave the building. The skyscraper has an in-built social order, where the higher your apartment is, the higher you are in the caste system. This leads to resentment from the people in the lower floors who feel they are getting a bad deal out of the system. This leads to a violent class war, where the residents are reduced to savagery in an alarmingly short space of time.
The high-rise itself serves as a microcosm of human capitalist society as a whole. The events and character actions that occur are of course highly exaggerated and severe, even if they do touch upon definite truths. But this is a very blackly satirical story and so realism is not a priority here. To this end the events are often wilfully surreal and absurd. This approach does mean, however, that this is not always a fully engaging experience, with many vignettes going off at tangents and the abundant humour sometimes meaning it is hard to take things altogether seriously some of the time. It's a quite fragmented film overall, with a not entirely linear story-line and the full-on nature of the visual presentation – while extremely good – can sometimes overcome the content. Still, I found a lot to like in this one and admired the boldness of approach. Director Ben Wheatley has to be given appropriate credit for bringing this to the screen in such an uncompromising manner, he is certainly putting together one of the most interesting bodies of work in cinema right now. Ultimately, High-Rise is certainly a film that will understandably be very divisive, but I thought, on the whole, it was a very good adaption of an excellent subversive novel.