The Upcoming
  • Cinema & Tv
    • Movie reviews
    • Show reviews
    • Interviews
    • Film festivals
      • Berlin
      • Cannes
      • Sundance London
      • Venice
      • London
  • Music
    • Live music
    • Album reviews
    • Interviews
  • Food & Drinks
    • News & Features
    • Restaurant & bar reviews
    • Interviews & Recipes
  • Theatre
    • Fringe
    • Vault Festival
    • Interviews
  • Art
  • Travel & Lifestyle
  • Interviews
  • Fashion & Beauty
    • Accessories
    • Beauty
    • News & Features
    • Shopping & Trends
    • Tips & How-tos
    • Fashion weeks
      • London Fashion Week
      • London Fashion Week Men’s
      • New York Fashion Week
      • Milan Fashion Week
      • Paris Fashion Week
      • Haute Couture
  • Join the team
    • Editorial unit
    • Our writers
    • Join the team
    • Join the mailing list
    • Support us
    • Contact us
  • Competitions
  • Facebook

  • Twitter

  • Instagram

  • YouTube

  • RSS

Culture Cinema & Tv Movie reviews

Only the Animals

Only the Animals | Movie review
25th May 2020
Avatar photo
Musanna Ahmed
Avatar
Musanna Ahmed
25 May 2020

Movie and show review

Musanna Ahmed

Only the Animals

★★★★★

Release date

29th May 2020

Platform

Curzon Home Cinema

If French director Dominik Moll was more prolific, he might be recognised as one of the more intriguing international filmmakers working today in the thriller genre following his terrific 2000 flick Harry, He’s Here to Help and the 2005 Palme D’or competitor Lemming. Only the Animals further evidences this filmmaker’s dexterity in creating mystery, suspense, and a tense, skilfully constructed yarn.

In this cold winter story set in the south of France, there are five people linked to the disappearance of a woman from a small village. Happy-go-lucky social worker Alice (Laure Calamy) is having an affair with Joseph (Damien Bonnard), who seems to know the most about the missing woman and keeps her dead body in a farmhouse for inexplicable reasons until all the threads have slowly unfolded. That leads us on to Evelyne (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi) and Marion (Nadia Tereszkiewicz), two social-class opposites who engage in a love affair that soon turns ugly.

The fifth element is a young con artist who works in the Ivory Coast called Armand (Guy Roger N’Drin). He coaxes Alice’s dreary husband Michel (Denis Ménochet) into sending him money by assuming a fake identity that exploits Michel’s lovelorn status. The bold structure requires patience and attention but cumulatively pays off in engaging ways and recalls the pre-Birdman works of Alejandro González Iñárritu such as Babel and Amores Perros: the style of storytelling that takes disparate narratives and remarkably coheres them. Moll doesn’t have the same strong cinematography as those Iñárritu movies – it would’ve been of great benefit for this story to be captured through a gritty lens too – but where it lacks in the visual sense, it makes up for it in character work and editing.

It’s quite awkward to recommend Only the Animals, a dark film about lies, loneliness and the ugly heart of human nature (albeit not without moments of humour), during such a difficult period in our lifetimes, but sometimes sombre films can provide catharsis. If one has the emotional capacity to watch something of this sort right now, Only the Animals is worth seeing.

★★★★★

Musanna Ahmed

Only the Animals is released digitally on demand on 29th May 2020.

Watch the trailer for Only the Animals here:

Related Itemsreview

More in Movie reviews

Candy Cane Lane

★★★★★
Guy Lambert
Read More

Eileen

★★★★★
Selina Sondermann
Read More

Wish

★★★★★
Guy Lambert
Read More

Girl

★★★★★
Umar Ali
Read More

Maestro

★★★★★
Filippo L'Astorina, the Editor
Read More

The Eternal Daughter

★★★★★
Selina Sondermann
Read More

Ronnie O’Sullivan: The Edge of Everything

★★★★★
Umar Ali
Read More

Rustin

★★★★★
Matthew McMillan
Read More

Napoleon

★★★★★
Musanna Ahmed
Read More
Scroll for more
Tap

Movie and show review

Musanna Ahmed

Only the Animals

★★★★★

Release date

29th May 2020

Platform

Curzon Home Cinema

  • Popular

  • Latest

  • TOP PICKS

  • Candy Cane Lane
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • The House of Bernarda Alba at the National Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • “It’s super important to put attention to childhood, it shapes who children become”: Lila Avilés on Tótem at the Belfast Film Festival
    Culture
  • Willie J Healey at Electric Brixton
    ★★★★★
    Live music
  • Candy Cane Lane
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • The House of Bernarda Alba at the National Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Willie J Healey at Electric Brixton
    ★★★★★
    Live music
  • Eileen
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • The Witches at the National Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • The House of Bernarda Alba at the National Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Willie J Healey at Electric Brixton
    ★★★★★
    Live music
  • The Witches at the National Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Wish
    ★★★★★
    Movie review
  • Feeling Afraid As If Something Terrible Is Going to Happen at Bush Theatre
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
The Upcoming
  • Contact us
  • Join the team
  • Subscribe to the mailing list
  • Support us
  • Writing for The Upcoming

Copyright © 2011-2023 FL Media