There are only a handful of moments during Ari Aster‘s unnerving, horrorsome new flick, Midsommar, were you find yourself chuckling. If only for a second. The group, for which the film follows off to the Swedish countryside, are freshly intoxicated on the grass through nature’s special potion. It’s only the beginning of the low-tide high. And as one of the local people stroll by, one of the ‘friends’ panics: “Oh fuck, it’s a new person”. Another yelps: “I don’t want any new people.” Whether it’s meant to be laugh out loud funny or not, its natural to be amused. The kind of drug-fueled paranoia which caters for the audiences own anxieties.
Does filmmaker Ari Aster want to distract us from horror, with these candid comedy snippets? As one trip sees grass growing through the flesh of a hand. And then she is up on her feet to run frantically into the forest. Aster still has his finger on the button that continues to stir your soul. Even if for a quick moment you don’t know it yourself. The Director’s Cut of Midsommar hardly alters any of this at all. Why would it?
Later, our protagonist is having such a blast she doesn’t even realize she is speaking Swedish with a native. It stopped me in my tracks, pretty sure I let out a laugh. But by this stage of the film I was pretty stoned by Aster’s cinematic injection.
Without wanting to reveal the context of some of the nudity by infringing more of these flashes of hysteria – like dangly bits – I would not go so far as to call Midsommar a comedy. Not even a black one. Many already do – and did when the film was first released in 2019. Some call it a horror, while others refuse to define it as such.
Like Aster’s debut feature, the deeply dark and devastating Hereditary, this storyteller’s horror lies in the unsettling, the disturbing, the human mental breakdown. Hand on a shoulder juxtaposing a Dun-Dun! music cue is just not his thing. That opening rumble amidst the wintery darkness is hardly a jump scare when the telephone rings. But Aster means to startle your nerves. There’s even a bathroom mirror shot as a character takes pills, but the camera pans straight to her before your psyche expects a surprise. Midsommar has varying degrees of horrific moments, both in action and impact, but can we call it a horror film outright? I am falling neither way, as I did then in the theatre and now four years on.
Ari Aster has himself admitted that writing the screenplay for Midsommar was a kind of attempted catharsis, following a recent break-up of his own. That’s either very clear here, or else it serves to beef up the story. Or vice versa, it really doesn’t matter. Whether you have experienced an arduous relationship disintegration yourself or not, Midsommar sets its stalls out early on the fading companionship, the longing to make it work, to not be alone, still clawing for any sparks left. Films can quite aptly use the physical setting to portray an emotional journey as this. With his Director’s Cut, Aster has immaculately enhanced this.
A young woman who openly admits she is co-dependent on her boyfriend of four years (though he’ll take an uncommitted guess at three and a half years), suffers an unimaginable loss, and clings to the one person she perhaps believes is all she has left. She takes herself out of her once comfort-zone. If you can even call it that. Still finding herself with no place else to go. Emotionally marooned, before realization of her partner’s unworthiness. As well as her own growth in self-value and shimmering identity. And in the end, has the mystifying clarity to make that decision once and for all. And that’s Midsommar. Kind of.
We open Midsommar in what appears to be winter. Tis the season for such harrowing a set-up. Snow falls outside, as tensions continue to dwell inside. Psychology student, Dani (the spell-binding Florence Pugh), is in a mental frenzy. Attempting to locate a bipolar sister, who has sent one of her foreboding ‘goodbye’ emails – though this one is urgently different.
Her boyfriend, Christian (Jack Reynor), seems lacklustre in all things, in particular Dani herself. She can feel his back-steps and sheer lack of enthusiasm for their relationship, but is just trying to hold it all together. So grand is Pugh here, the whimpering, slumbered Dani could just as easily have been granted less empathy, where it not for the embodiment of pain that the actress oozes.
In our warmer side of the heart, we may assume that Christian’s dickness may well come from his wanting out, not knowing how to actually articulate it. If he’s lukcy. But Dani has to handle the rejection, lack of affection, and of course the immense grief she is about to embark on. And he is actually a dick.
A potential break-up ought not aid Dani’s concern for her sister. Especially when an early phone call with her parents suggests that maybe nobody else cares as much as she. But on the brink or not, the none reciprocation of Christian’s efforts show him to be spineless and unsympathetic.
Even the indifference of his friends – Josh, Mark, Pelle – urging him to basically get rid of Dani once and for all, has a spiky logic to it. But Christian even tries to pull the wool over their eyes – he just can’t decide who to please or how to do it. These petty debates, blokes talking shit around a table of beers, serve to only jolt the action when Christian’s phone rings. And yes, it’s Dani.
The misery and terror of her howling down the phone is possibly one of the most haunting moments about the entire of Midsommar. We know what has happened, we saw it coming, and still it shakes you out of your skin. The cry of despair from Pugh, and the high-pitched tragic strings, lingers painfully, all the while your subconscious knows the mastery of the filmmaker’s artistry.
So what’s so different about this Director’s Cut? come the murmurs of curiosity. It’s tough not to know with the vast influx of information at our fingertips. The genius is not in the scoping of the details though, but through experiencing the motion picture once again. At a little short of three hours in length now, this Midsommar allows Aster to have his audience further appreciate the dynamics of the original release where parts were misunderstood for lethargy or under-development. And even that is pushing it for what was an almost flawless film.
The longer cut extends Christian’s aimless existence, for one, including him approaching the mysterious redhead, and sharing the ignorance of Mark, who agitatedly missed the whole rock-top sacrifices. The drive through Sweden is given more car time, with discussions on Josh’s thesis, and more examples of the brittleness of these so-called friendships – as well as Christian continuing to falsify himself with each interaction.
There’s even a brief shot as the elders ceremony begins of a boy turning towards to us – or at least in our direction – and then back. Later as Dani partakes in domestic duties, the mother figure of the commune stands and watches for a while, as though reaffirming to us of how most of this was preordained. And going to plan. Or the scripture being read by the same character in an earlier scene, we are given chance to notice the pages are smeared with coloured paint making most of the text unreadable.
What is also added – and the closest aspect of the cut that you get a glimmer of why it wasn’t present originally – there’s a second gathering. This time by the lake, where a tree is hurled into it, and a horn is bellowed by a man across the waters. And then, horrifyingly, a child believe it or not is almost thrown in too (under a huge rock no less), masked by the community members as a test for courage.
At this stage, of course, Dani has seen way more than enough. The lakeside shenanigans gives our heroine much more of a gusto in simply wanting to leave this place. And thus the conversation with Christian becomes much more than that in the Director’s Cut. “I don’t want to acclimate” she tells him, a snippet of dialogue missing from the original release, but part of the trailer (fun fact).
Dani actually now has the courage and fearlessness to actually confront this jackass. That he has been pulling away and she has been in denial. Her bolster of strength in character at this stage is a Godsend for the narrative and her character. And Christian cannot handle that she nailed it.
It’s incredible that by stretching it’s legs with the longer cut, Midsommar is afforded the endurance to keep us waiting while utilizing the time to pull us in further. The result is – without judging it by the standards of other Director’s Cuts – a superior feat of story-telling for a film that was already clambering for masterpiece status.
Ari Aster knows what he is doing. Like much of the rest of Midsommar, the director has worked hard to weave together strands of the story to be, I won’t say predictable. Snapping horror conventions (though not exactly breaking them), Aster lingers most of the chills during broad daylight. You know something bad is going to happen, on numerous occasions, but the element of surprise is not always as affecting as the unexpected jarring of the senses.
That opening twenty minutes, before Sweden is hardly mentioned, is a remarkably astute, heart-grinding sequence of filmmaking. Like Hereditary (and I will try and keep the comparisons to a minimum), the brisk, booming sound design feels so organic, piercing your eardrums with ease. Drowned out sounds at a social situation are late repeated.
Conforming to Dani’s perspective forms a crucial arc of Midsommar. Through intricate, unbridled sound, Aster’s film gains further channels of sensory depth. The screams that can be heard not too far off to be noticed but not wholly alarming. Or that’s humming, vibrating score that taunts the whole way. Can Dani hear it all too?
And the music, pretty much part of the same soundscape that rattles your nerves early on. It’s a swaying, penetrating film score from Bobby Krlic (AKA The Haxan Cloaks), taunting and emoting with its slicing strings, slowly soaring harp and Nordic chorals. Quite astonishing at times.
So, Midsommar kind of hollows you early on. Dani’s crying – or rather hyperventilating – is a trauma in itself. The magnificent Florence Pugh seems to hold her breathe, and gasp an almighty cry. There are few words to describe how good the actress is here. In one particularly scene, Dani’s face drops to the floor at the mention of her sorrowful loss. That sadness just appears on her face like magic.
Almost broken, she rushes to the bathroom to wail. Only, she enters the box-sized wash room of an airplane. The director merges the despair with an intricate leap of time and place. Aster and Pugh appear to be a combination made for cinematic greatness.
That trip to Sweden then. One which Christian neglected to mention to Dani, who overheard the buzz of the vacation at a party no less. His sense of duty, of course, is to invite her along, given she is an anxiety-soaked mess who has just lost her sister and both parents in terrible circumstances. And it is the summer after all. The midsummer celebration in Northern Swedish no-man’s-land, is a seemingly warm invite from Pelle, who is from this commune. And the festivities of this importance are only commemorated every ninety years.
From the bleak midwinter, to the gorgeous sun-filled outdoors of the summertime. Such a vivid contrast to the gloom of the ‘prologue’, you may need your sunglasses. But given the idyllic oddness on display, and the homage Aster is paying to the cultish horror, we expect nothing more than things to get, well, very eerie. The world building is extraordinary. There’s a vibrancy to the beautiful surroundings and the folks’ welcoming aura, but this is not going to be a picnic.
The Swedish tourist board are likely far from delighted with this stage of grief that Aster lays out. Such strange hospitality starts to enter the bloodstream from the moment the sun hits our faces. The gang, as well as a young British couple, remain outsiders among the white-clad Hårga people. So embroiled in their pagan beliefs, the open air location soon morphs into a place for which there is no escape.
Dani’s journey, which is the one we primarily root for, gradually takes a different course to those of her company. Once she shakes off the hallucinations of her dead sister and parents, a kind of haze befalls her – given the amount of herbal cocktails she is asked to drink. I mean, it’s a celebration, right?
The hypnosis of the visitors (and indeed us to a varying degree) aids our suspension of disbelief. Why would you stick around having watched two elders happily splat to their deaths from a clifftop? Its not like the locals would fabricate your safe departure, when really ripping you open and stringing you up.
When the said elders drink and look at eachother, during a rather chilling dinner ritual, there’s a sad inevitability. Again, you sense what is coming. And it is that anticipation that often fucks with your own psyche. Aster shifts, ever so slightly, some of the horror (there’s that word again) pieces. Like when we see Dani’s startled reaction before the elder jumping. This also happens to be the goriest scene of the entire film. And the placement of these graphic images at somewhere prior to the midpoint of the film, almost knocks you off your perch in regards to what you might be accustomed to with such tales.
The destruction of the group dynamics and the continuous bizarre events build a tension you’re never quite sure about. The so-called friends seem to be on different pages – in fact, so selfish and freshly fucked up, they don’t act like friends at all. Their possible demise looks a certainty, but you’re always second-guessing when and how. Like Pelle tells Dani at one strange moment of compassion, you never got a chance to feel lost. You watch these clueless people, their lives just not their own anymore. When do you come down from this? Do you come down from this?
As an audience member, I left the theatre in 2019 not necessarily looking over my shoulder, but rather trying to process how my psychological state was now resembling scrambled eggs. But there’s a indescribable captivation to sitting through Midsommar. The film radiates cinematic aromas. Even when grotesque, or riddled with dread, or just simply taking your breath away. And I mean that literally, not figuratively. There are moments in Midsommar when you’re very conscious of your own interrupted exhale.
Ari Aster hits a second home run, then. Some will argue that Midsommar is not a perfect picture. That there may or may not be very temporary lulls in your engagement in the last quarter, but nothing like being smashed over the head with a giant mallet. The Director’s Cut, in the opinion of this review, certainly put those criticisms to bed. And the overall vibe of the film’s themes and output will continue to divide audiences.
Aster’s attention to detail is something great, too. The saddest of the film nerds, like myself, will have noticed the common incorrect spelling (‘somehting’) in an email Dani writes. And that her sister Terri’s computer has has mic muted – she did not want to be disturbed of her mass suicide by the tinging of email alerts. Or her armpit sweat patches as Dani hurtles off into the forest during a panic attack. What are those commune people in white doing in the background? Scissors placed under the pillow of a baby’s crib. The darker colour of Christian’s drink.
I am more inclined to say that Break-Up Movie is now a genre. Dani takes herself away to clear her head, albeit via opiate intake and an all-embracing community. One which will gladly scream with you. Christian’s “Oh” at the suggestion they hang out later is clear as day. His “I’m sorry?” to Dani like he doesn’t even know how to handle his own manipulation. And then weaponised himself with her insecurities and fragile projections. Even when he tells his friends he has invited Dani he’s left the seating area and out of shot.
There are specific looks Dani gives Christian, as the pennies drop on just how insignificant he is. And deservedly so. The dramatic irony that she had to be inebriated from her rational thoughts to see his true colours. Am I allowed to praise Florence Pugh once again here, not many people have demonstrated such mental torment on film as well as this.
Whatever the end result, Midsommar is a meticulously, well-thought out motion picture. Captivating in how we witness all its ceremonial actions and the people involved. This is a world that can take some getting used to, and Aster affords us the time to at least some way acclimatise to our surroundings. Even if it is not all smelling of roses.
There’s subtle guidance, too, with many of the community seemingly addressing Dani. Even a cut-away during turbulence on the plane reflects her transitioning inner commotion. Not until her pure euphoria during the maypole dance, does Dani seem to be free. The newly-crowned May Queen – bearing an abundance of breathing flowers – may sob in fearful dismay in the finale’s extraordinary crescendo, but that emerging, visceral smile signifies a rapturous closure. And somehow, after all we’ve been through, there’s glory in the end.
