✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

You have reached the limit of free articles.


To enjoy unlimited access to Culture Whisper sign up for FREE.
Find out more about Culture Whisper

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy

Each week, we send newsletters and communication featuring articles, our latest tickets invitations, and exclusive offers.

Occasional information about discounts, special offers and promotions.


OR
LOG IN

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

Thanks for signing up to Culture Whisper.
Please check your inbox for a confirmation email and click the link to verify your account.



EXPLORE CULTURE WHISPER
✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy
Forgot your username or password?
Don't have an account? Sign Up

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

If you click «Log in with Facebook» and are not a Culture Whisper user, you agree to our Terms & Conditions and to our Privacy Policy, which includes our Cookie Use

Support Us Login
  • Home
  • Going Out
    • Things to do
    • Food & Drink
    • Theatre
    • Visual Arts
    • Cinema
    • Kids
    • Festival
    • Gigs
    • Dance
    • Classical Music
    • Opera
    • Immersive
    • Talks
  • Staying In
    • TV
    • Books
    • Cook
    • Podcast
    • Design
    • Netflix
  • Life & Style
    • Beauty
    • Fashion
    • Gifting
    • Wellbeing
    • Lifestyle
    • Shopping
    • Jewellery
  • Explore
  • Shopping
  • CW SHOPS
  • Support Us
  • Get Started
  • Tickets
  • CW SHOPS
Get the Best of London Life, Culture and Style
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
Cinema

The Lobster film review ★★★★★

16 Oct 15 – 30 Nov 15, Screening times vary

Yorgos Lanthimos' The Lobster is a darkly comic satire of modern releationships

By CW Contributor on 13/10/2015

1 CW reader is interested
Still from The Lobster
Still from The Lobster
The Lobster film review 5 The Lobster film review Caroline Halstead

Romantic science fiction meets creepy creatures in new dystopian satire The Lobster, Cannes premiere and English-language debut from Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos (who picked up a best foreign film Oscar nomination for his award-winning 2009 film Dogtooth).


In inimitable style Lanthimos comments on our conflicting drive as humans to both pair off and be single. Rife with deadpan surrealism, his characters seem to exist in a humourless world, a parallel, dystopian universe, where the only law is that people be coupled with a partner (preferably with a mutual 'defining characteristic').


Once a couple becomes separated, they are sent from The City to The Hotel – part rehabilitation centre, part prison – where this mandate is enforced in various ways. But if they can't find a new mate after 45 days, the 'Loners' are turned into animals and released into The Woods.



Lanthimos' world is cruel and unforgiving. Everything is held up to scrutiny. If singletons lack sufficient attributes to win a mate, then they have no choice but to undergo the painful metamorphosis and be turned into an animal (be it dog, camel, shetland pony – they can, at least, choose).


But it's their inability to see the funny side, the deadpan language in which they speak, that makes Lanthimos' characters so wickedly funny. These awkward, gawkish people are unable to hide their true selves: their behaviour ranges from politeness, to rage, pain, love, but all under a glaze of a seemingly autistic lack of self-awareness coupled with an extreme fear of the world around them. They are like children learning how to lie for the first time.


Early on the inscrutable David (Farrell), is asked upon arrival at The Hotel whether he's attracted to women or men. He answers, after some thought, 'heterosexual' – though follows up by asking if bisexual is option, to which the concierge responds that as a result of 'organisational issues' they can no longer register people in this category. 'You have to decide right now whether you want to be registered as homosexual or heterosexual,' she says, officiously.


Lanthimos' film is littered with witty observations about society's unwritten codes. Perpetually nuanced, the film lapses from utterly surreal to so near-naturalistic that we constantly find ourselves re-evaluating this world; its rules; these people, their capacity for emotion.


Shot on location in Ireland with a cast that includes the Oscar-winning Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardener), 3-time BAFTA winner Olivia Colman (Broadchurch), Colin Farrell (In Bruges), Ben Whishaw (Skyfall, Lilting), Léa Seydoux (Blue is the Warmest Colour, Inglourious Basterds) and John C. Reilly (Chicago), the names on board pay testament to Lanthimos' originality: the Dogtooth director is already betraying himself as an auteur of the most peculiar kind.


Unconventional is hardly the word for it. A film that must be seen to be believed, The Lobster will make you laugh, wince, be moved and disturbed, all in the flash of a lumbering camel.


by India Halstead

What The Lobster film review
Where Various Locations | MAP
Nearest tube Leicester Square (underground)
When 16 Oct 15 – 30 Nov 15, Screening times vary
Price £determined by cinema
Website Click here for more information



Most popular

Things to do in London this weekend: 3–5 February
Things to do in London this weekend: 3–5 February
Zadie Smith new novel, The Fraud, to be released in 2023, photo Justin Holler
An A to Z of trends for 2023
Helena Bonham Carter in Nolly, ITVX (Photo: ITV)
What to watch on TV this week

Editor's Picks


  • 1. FESTIVAL FEVER

    Culture Whisper's highlights at this year's BFI London Film Festival

    2. WORLD CINEMA

    The best foreign films 2015 has seen so far

    3. UNIQUE CINEMAS IN LONDON

    Our top places to watch arthouse and independent cinema

    4. MALIAN MUSIC IN EXILE

    How music can transcend oppression

    5. TANGERINES

    The sharp and powerful Estonian film tipped for an Oscar

Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
1

London Film Festival

Satire

Romance

Surreal

Cannes Film Festival

You might like

  • Dane DeHaan, Robert Pattinson, Life film still

    Life: review ★★★★★ James Dean biopic too flat to be chilling

  • Tangerines film still

    Tangerines: Estonian film review ★★★★★

  • Ariane Labed, Fidelio: Alice's Journey film still

    Fidelio: Alice's Journey, film review ★★★★★

  • The Big Lebowski film still

    Feed Me Films Presents: The Big Lebowski



  • The Culture Whisper team
  • Support Us
  • Tickets
  • Contact us
  • Press
  • FAQ
  • Privacy
  • Terms and conditions
  • Cookies
  • Discover
  • Venues
  • Restaurants
  • Stations
  • Boroughs
Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
×