The Lobster

Director: Yorgos Lanthimos

2015 / 119min / DCP

Set in a near-future in which coupledom has been made mandatory past a certain age, Lanthimos’s high-concept absurdist tragicomedy opens with recently divorcé David (a grimly funny Colin Farrell) arriving at a seaside resort/prison where singles are gathered and given a few days in which to pair off with a mate, after which they’ll be turned into an animal of their choice. No explanation is given for why such a system was thought necessary, nor for why the citizens of this society—Léa Seydoux, Rachel Weisz, and John C. Reilly among their number—communicate in stilted, measured to-the-point language, but the perverse premise opens up ample allegorical possibilities.