Vivarium: Neon NZ Film Review

Irish director Lorcan Finnegan's Vivarium has been compared to Black Mirror, because of look and tone.Though this tale of two would-be surbanites (Jesse Eisenberg, Imogen Poots) finding themselves stranded in a housing estate after a visit to an oddball estate agent's, has more in common with a darker Tales of The Unexpected or Inside No 9 via Escher.

Gemma (Poots, digging deep when needed and yielding great rewards) and Tom (Eisenberg, increasingly detached and desperate) are wannabe homeowners, given the chance to visit a new housing estate called "Yonder".

When their creepy estate agent disappears while they're looking around the house which is "near enough and yet far enough away", the pair find themselves stuck when they can't escape Yonder....

Finnegan creates an atmosphere of unease early on in the piece, after a cutesy opening showcases both Gemma and Tom's relationship and their approach to life.

But with some digital trickery and some genuinely unsettling moments (it's wise to go into this unspoiled, and with a blank mind approach), what Finnegan crafts is something that haunts you after you've seen it.

Colour palettes add to the cinema of unease, and the sense of suspense as the rug threatens to be pulled out from under you at any moment. Parts of the film occasionally feel like the idea's been stretched as far as it can with its essentially two-hander cast, but just when the film seems to be out of breath, an audacious third act moment visually jolts you back into it.

There's a satire in Vivarium here both of suburban expectations and family expectations - albeit poured through a prism of genuine discomfort.

It's heady, thrilling, exciting, frustrating and audacious - Vivarium truly messes with you - but its ride is well worth hopping on.a