13/02/2022 - BERLINALE 2022: Peter Strickland’s new film may feature frequent mentions of intestinal gasses and flatulence. Those seeking personal medical advice should consult with a licensed physician

Peter Strickland made a name for himself stabbing cabbage in Berberian Sound Studio [+see also:
trailer
film profile], so it’s only fitting that in Flux Gourmet [+see also:
trailer
interview: Peter Strickland
film profile], screening in Encounters at the Berlinale, he is further investigating the sounds made by various edible items. Now, Toby Jones’ sound engineer is replaced by a culinary collective (Fatma Mohamed, Ariane Labed and Asa Butterfield), fully dedicated to exploring the concept of “sonic cooking” – an activity named after Strickland’s own band of yesteryear, apparently. Invited over for an art residency that feels more like a quarantine, they eat, obviously, take slow walks in the garden, reveal their first erotic experiences featuring eggs, and bicker with their affluent patron (Gwendoline Christie) about their use of a flanger. Soon, everyone is on the verge of exploding.

Especially poor Stones (Makis Papadimitrou), hired to interview them and yet forced to concentrate more on his health issues than writing. Constantly bloated and flatulent, Stones is in pain. Being surrounded by other people 24/7 doesn’t help, so he tiptoes around at night, hoping for some temporary (and hopefully not too loud) release. But his suffering actually attracts Elle, the collective’s leader, and she starts incorporating it into her live performances as well. No wonder – given that even the latest incarnation of Jackass has been getting rave reviews everywhere, bodily functions are clearly having a moment.

It all sounds wacky, but Strickland’s actors – who at one point look like The Big Lebowski’s Nihilists, although nobody is threatening anyone’s “johnson” for a change – are playing it straight. More amusing than laugh-out-loud funny, his fifth feature amasses too many elements, though, and fashion styles (with Christie’s collaboration with Giles Deacon coming off like a twisted take on Dior’s “New Look”), to create a fully convincing environment. There are blurred orgies, because that’s how the audience shows their appreciation here, a very public gastroscopy and so much attention paid to excrement that it would all go very nicely alongside another Berlinale offering, Oink [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Mascha Halberstad
film profile], a stop-motion animation featuring an extremely gassy pig. In Strickland’s The Duke of Burgundy [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], for example, all the weirdness didn’t completely obscure the heart. But here, he comes dangerously close.

Then again, it’s not to say that – among the muffled sounds of someone breaking wind – this film doesn’t ask some interesting questions. If an artist manages to successfully shock her audience, does it matter if she lies to them at the same time? Does it make the performance less valid somehow, even though the emotion elicited by it was most certainly real? While he’s at it, Strickland also takes a closer look at the kitchen itself, presented as a war zone of sorts, where gender roles clash and female aspirations come to a crashing halt. It’s almost as if a woman could be either the Donna Reed of her time, delivering “lively recipes” from a 1950s cookbook to satisfy her husband, or a performance artist reclaiming the space to the triumphant sound of her minions cutting up veggies. Talk about extremes.

Strickland seems to be mocking everyone here, from artists to journalists to those who fund them, always expecting a little something in return, but at the same time, he remains sympathetic to their struggles, broken relationships and a desire to create something meaningful – even when you can’t stand the people you are creating it with. Which is, let’s face it, most of the time. Intestinal problems or not.

Flux Gourmet is a UK-Hungarian-US co-production staged by Red Breast Productions, Pioneer Pictures, Lunapark Pictures, IFC Productions and Bankside Films, which is also handling its world sales.