Kinds of Kindness Review
Kinds of Kindness (2024) Film Review, a movie directed by Yorgos Lanthimos, written by Efthimis Filippou and Yorgos Lanthimos and starring Emma Stone, Jesse Plemons, Willem Dafoe, Margaret Qualley, Hong Chau, Tessa Bourgeois, Mamoudou Athie, Joe Alwyn and Lindsey G. Smith.
Filmmaker Yorgos Lanthimos has never really faltered with one of his films although he comes pretty close with his latest, Kinds of Kindness. Emma Stone, Jesse Plemons, Willem Dafoe and Hong Chau play pivotal roles in the three tales told in this new picture but even they can’t save the film from having a slow-moving structure that could make audiences lose interest midway through each segment despite a few interesting final revelations that are revealed individually within each story.
This film opens with an old song on the soundtrack. “Sweet Dreams are Made of These” plays over the Searchlight logo which hints that maybe these tales the movie spins are meant to be shaped by dreams more than by reality. That notion seems to kick in when we first meet Jesse Plemons’s character, Robert, who seems dictated by his big boss, Raymond, played by Willem Dafoe. Raymond wants Robert to crash into a certain car hard whether or not it causes the death of the other person involved. In fact, that other person has supposedly agreed to die, if need be. Plemons’s character’s significant other is Sarah (Hong Chau) who cannot have a child. One woman asks Robert when Sarah is having a baby and Robert must share the harsh reality of the situation. But, we soon learn that Sarah’s miscarriages were really abortions unbeknownst to Sarah. Dafoe’s character isn’t sensible at all here and isn’t supposed to be. That’s not the problem, though. This segment of the film runs out of steam about halfway through before it all leads to a somewhat interesting conclusion. By the way, the movie has end titles for each of its three segments which include the cast members.
In the second, slightly more interesting, section of the movie, we meet Plemons as Daniel, an offbeat cop who talks to random criminals in his precinct. When Daniel is with some friends, he asks to watch an old video of his loved one, Liz (Emma Stone) who has disappeared without a trace. These friends suggest that would be awkward and we soon learn why as the video is played and it’s that of an orgy with two couples having rough sex. When Liz reappears, there are some interesting possibilities such as the one that this “Liz” isn’t really the same woman from Daniel’s previous life. This part of the movie poses intriguing questions. When Daniel’s nightstick is used to spice up sex, it seems a lot less erotic than one would think as the film unveils its thematic elements.
All bets are off when the last section of the film arrives that begins with a woman trying to bring a dead body back to life in a morgue. The bad smell turns the lady off but she’s determined even though she fails at what she’s trying to do. Stone plays a character named Emily in this third “chapter.” Emily drives the plot which concentrates on the inclusion of some kind of strange cult. People must be purified to engage in sexual activity and Dafoe, of course, pops up here again as one of the most eccentric characters in recent films and it’s to the actor’s credit that he, once again, succeeds in playing a weirdo (or two) here in this movie.
The stories all generally move at a snail’s pace. The acting is fascinating at times but the movie lacks the depth of Lanthimos’s previous films. There isn’t much substance here beyond the obvious and the exaggerated happenings are oddly dull at times though Lanthimos doesn’t spare the audience some graphic details which, unfortunately, neither shock or impress the audience like they did in the filmmaker’s previous work. The brilliant Dogtooth this is not.
Emma Stone gets some moments to shine. They are mostly in the third tale although she is sprinkled in other sections of the film somewhat adequately. The last scenes of the movie utilize Stone’s talents the best, not the least of which is a wild dance that her character does which has been seen briefly in the film’s advertisements. Jesse Plemons is the MVP here, though, and has three almost completely different parts in this picture. Plemons doesn’t disappoint with his range here and creates multi-faceted characters who audiences probably won’t relate to at all. Still, viewers will appreciate Plemons’s dedication to his craft. Hong Chau, Margaret Qualley and Mamoudou Athie all play second fiddle to Stone, Plemons and Dafoe. Chau comes up with the best work of the supporting players but, ultimately, the stars chew on the scenery in this movie more than the character actors do.
Lanthimos can do better work than this. In fact, this is a step back for the director. It seemed too good to be true that he could make another prestige project so soon after the multi-Oscar-winning Poor Things. The themes Lanthimos chooses to explore this time around would have been better analyzed if the movie didn’t take its sweet time building to the stories’ climaxes. Today’s viewers don’t have the patience to sit through the sluggish way this film presents its material.
That being said, Stone and Plemons do dazzle in their roles here. Dafoe is his usual charismatic and quirky self. Lanthimos could have made his style work to the film’s advantage had there been more substance to each of the three stories. Though the last one ends with a bang, after sitting through nearly two-and-a-half hours of material that lacks sympathetic characters, it may be an example of too little, too late.
Kinds of Kindness won’t stop Lanthimos in his tracks. He’ll move on to more Oscar-worthy material. There’s no denying that Kinds of Kindness could have used a good edit. If some of the dragging sections of the three stories were trimmed a bit, the movie might have moved at a quicker pace. If you have the patience, though, Kinds of Kindness may be worth sticking through because the final reveals of each section are, as previously stated, interesting.
Rating: 6/10
Leave your thoughts on this Kinds of Kindness review and the film below in the comments section. Readers seeking to support this type of content can visit our Patreon Page and become one of FilmBook’s patrons. Readers seeking more film reviews can visit our Movie Review Page, our Movie Review Twitter Page, and our Movie Review Facebook Page. Want up-to-the-minute notifications? FilmBook staff members publish articles by Email, Mobile App, Google News, Feedly, Twitter, Faceboo
