All week, Oscar contenders have been outside, promoting their movies, and now it’s Demi Moore’s turn. She’s in France promoting The Substance alongside filmmaker Coralie Fargeat. Though The Substance premiered at Cannes earlier this year, it is only just now opening in Fargeat’s home country.
The Substance opened in North America in the middle of TIFF madness, I missed it there, and never caught up with it when I got home, but I FINALLY saw it because it is now streaming on Mubi, and whew, it is gross. I mean, it’s good, but it is definitely body horror, so if you’re easily repulsed, just know it is as gross as you’ve heard. Good, though, let me stress that.
Demi is one of the Nineties icons contending for Best Actress, and Fargeat is in the running for Best Original Screenplay, too. As much as the Academy has changed in recent years, they still don’t really go for gross and/or weird movies, although that one time they did give Best Picture to the fish f-cking movie. The Substance is gross, but Demi’s performance is excellent—Margaret Qualley is also very good, though she continues to fly under the trophy trail radar—and this is where being an icon with lots of name recognition can help you.
Because while most of us probably agree you should watch a movie before voting for it, the reality is, lots of Oscar voters don’t watch everything, or even most things, and they just vote for their friends, what they worked on, or the person they admire, and Demi has a lot of admirers. And in The Substance she has a, er, substantial role, a real showcase unlike anything she’s had in recent memory. Just the word of mouth could work for her. But that isn’t keeping her from hustling, showing up where she needs to, keeping The Substance front of mind.
This is a film trying to maintain momentum from Cannes to next March, every step and repeat counts, and Demi is making it all count.
