Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Velvet Buzzsaw’ On Netflix, A Weird Horror Satire Starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Rene Russo

The art world is strange; artists dismissed while they’re alive are lauded when they’re dead, works that look like scribbles generate millions on the open market, and the people who review shows seem like they’re pulling their critiques out of their bums. So of course it’s ripe for satire, and Velvet Buzzsaw attempts to do just that, layering some blood and gore on top of the obnoxiousness. Read on for more info…

VELVET BUZZSAW: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: At Art Basel in Miami Beach, we are introduced to the world and business of modern art where these characters exist. Morf Vandewalt (Jake Gyllenhaal) is a very influential art critic, who has a very discerning taste for modern art, and doesn’t hesitate to be blunt about stuff he thinks is derivative or just plain bad.

One of the most powerful gallery owners in Los Angeles, Rhodora Haze (Rene Russo), is also there, trying to negotiate deals to represent top artists, and try to retain her current stable, like Piers (John Malkovich), who manages his art empire as a Jeff Koons-esque brand, having a staff that produces prints and reproductions but hasn’t done much original art himself. She’s also trying to recruit Darmish (Daveed Diggs), a renowned street artist currently with a more down-to-earth collective.

Morf is friends with Rhodora’s assistant Josephina (Zawe Ashton), who is getting frustrated that she can’t promote artists to her boss. The two of them commiserate and then have sex, which surprises both considering Morf is already in a relationship with a man.

After getting berated by Rhodora, Josephina vows to strike out on her own. When a neighbor of hers dies suddenly, she learns that everything in his apartment is going to be destroyed, at his request. She goes upstairs and finds dozens of remarkable paintings that reflected the old man’s deep pain and emotional turmoil. She decides to sell the dead man’s art herself, and when Rhodora gets wind of it, she forces her way into the deal, manipulating the flow of the work going to the public in order to raise the value of what she sells.

One problem: There was a reason why the man, who had a very dark past and did not do his art for commerce, wanted everything destroyed. The more people touch his works, the more the works come alive, eventually murdering everyone involved, from Rhodora’s rival Jon Dondon (Tom Sturridge) to Gretchen (Toni Collette), a museum director-turned-private consultant.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: Horror satires like Scream and Get Out, but not nearly as funny or scary.

Performance Worth Watching: We’re happy about Rene Russo’s comeback over the last few years, so seeing her as the deliciously devious Rhodora was the most fun part of the movie. We also like Natalia Dyer (Stranger Things) as Coco, an opportunistic assistant that seems to find almost every body in the movie.

Memorable Dialogue: “Gestation implies birth,” says Piers to Jon Dondon when he shows the dealer his empty studio. “Ideas die as soon as they appear. This is a slaughterhouse.”

Single Best Shot: Collette’s “death by orb with holes” is the best one in the movie.

Sex and Skin: Josephina has sex with both Morf and Darmish, and it seems like Morf likes sitting around naked. We see mostly Gyllenhaal’s tush and the tush of the man he ditched for Josephina.

Our Take: Velvet Buzzsaw is written and directed by Dan Gilroy (Roman J. Israel, Esq.) and a lot of it doesn’t hang together well. Characters go nowhere, storylines get dropped, and the nature of how this supernatural being kills these people is inconsistent. Does it just work through the dead artist’s work? Or is it just working through any art? It seems to be the latter, but since we see it manifest itself in the dead artist’s work, it seems like that rule is what is established, making it confusing when it kills via other art, not matter what the medium,

There’s other aspects of the movie that don’t link together. Rhodora was once in a punk band called Velvet Buzzsaw, and has a tattoo of the band’s logo, but that isn’t really explored. Josephina’s relationships are more transactional than romantic, and that’s never examined. We see Rhodora encourage Piers to just do art for himself and see if that unblocks him, but the payoff to that side story has little to do with the general plot.

But what’s supposed to be both a horror satire and a satire of the capricious and random business of modern art, where private owners have taste makers decide what to spend their millions on, ends up being a movie with obnoxious characters having obnoxious conversations about obnoxious art. Gyllenhaal’s Morf is every filmmaker’s view of a critic — snobbish and whiny, always thinking they’re more influential than they are. He does an OK job of it, except for the constant move he makes of putting his head in his hand like he’s thinking, but it feels like that role could have been less of a caricature.

Really, the movie is about Josephina, and Ashton’s performance really made us want to see the story from her perspective rather than some of the film’s more cartoonish characters.

Our Call: SKIP IT. Velvet Buzzsaw is neither scary nor funny, and its satire completely misses its target.

Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, VanityFair.com, Playboy.com, Fast Company’s Co.Create and elsewhere.

Stream Velvet Buzzsaw on Netflix