Under The Skin (2/5 Stars)

‘Under The Skin’ the new movie by Jonathan Glazer and starring Scarlett Johannson does not suffer from any error in style but rather a lack of substance. This would be a good half hour movie but has been expanded beyond all reason to feature length.

Scarlett Johannson is an alien from a place we are not told. She is assisted on this Earth by another alien that is never introduced. He rides a motorcycle. That is the extent of his character depth. Scarlett whose character remains nameless as far as I could tell spends her time seducing Scottish men into her lair where they walk hypnotized into a vast blackness of goo (see trailer). Once there, something horrifying happens to the tune of a creepy score. What exactly happens or why the aliens want to do it remains a mystery. That would take us the midpoint of the movie and it would take as many sentences as before to explain all that happens for the rest.

The fault seems to be the writer/director Jonathan Glazer who IMDB suggests is not all that much of a writer. He is more of a director of music videos. Such a revelation makes sense given that there is almost no dialogue in the picture and the best thing happens to be the creepy score. At this point one would take pleasure in the little things. For instance, Scarlett Johannson is a beautiful woman and she is naked for many minutes here. Most of this is less of a sexual nature and more of ‘Alien curious of one’s new body’ sort of thing but that hardly matters right. The role is reminiscent of Jeff Bridges in ‘Starman.’ Of course Jeff Bridges had far more to do, whereas Johansson’s role is somewhat limited. She is better looking though.

What else can I say here? Do you like Scotland? Because that’s where the movie is set.

The title comes from the end scene and is appropriate and rightly strange and creepy. However so little goes before and for such a long time that it is not exactly a big enough payoff to make the movie worth seeing. If the movie was supposed to be about anything more than what I've written about, I must confess I did not pick up on it.