Director: Gore Verbinski
Starring: Jason Isaacs, Dane DeHaan, Celia Imrie, Mia Goth, Adrian Schiller, Carl Lumbly, Susanne Wuest
Rating: 18
Running Time: 146 minutes
Released Date: 24 Feb, 2017
A CURE FOR WELLNESS, set deep within the Swiss Alps, secluded from the busyness and stresses from the outside world you’ll find a peaceful haven. A green lawn courtyard stands in the middle of the grand historic buildings where patients are treated to the onsite spa facilities which help ‘cure’ them from the stresses of modern life. Gore Verbinski (THE PIRATES OF THE CARIBEAN trilogy) makes the ‘wellness centre’ sound and look idyllic, but it isn’t all what it seems.
Lockhart (Dane Dehann) is a young, ambitious and arrogant stock broker who lands himself a promotion. His company is going through a merger, but a few dodgy deals from Lockhart’s past have come to light. Looking for someone to pin the blame onto, the stern and ruthless CEO’s set Lockhart the task of going to the spa to retrieve his colleague Pembrooke (Harry Groener) to place the blame on him. Should Lockhart fail, then the CEO’s will inform the SEC and Lockhart risks looking his job.
What sounds like a simple task is ambushed by the creepy goings on at the spa. When Lockhart arrives at the spa, he is met by the less than helpful nurses and the dressing gown clad patients playing croquet on the lawn, who all hope to be ‘cured’ by drinking the spa’s medicinal water. Lockhart senses something is wrong and tries to leave but his attempts are quickly stopped as he goes from visitor to patient.
“Why would you want to leave?” Lockhart is asked by the wellness centre’s youngest resident Hannah (Mia Goth). She has a point; the scenery and the cinematography are stunning. Hannah balances on the walls of the spa, the snow-capped Swiss Alps fit perfectly into the wide angle shot as the sun begins to set behind her – surely in a place this beautiful nothing bad could happen…
Dr Volmer (Jason Isaacs), the spa’s director puts Lockhart through a series of treatments to help ‘cure’ him, these of which include eels (lots and lots of eels), near drowning and some stomach churning dental treatment (not for the faint hearted). The trouble is, we never quite warm to Lockhart, when we’re first introduced to him he’s rude and obnoxious and this doesn’t change throughout the course of the film.
A CURE FOR WELLNESS hints to an underlying message about the stresses of modern life and how it has a profound effect on our health, but it seems Verbenski becomes too distracted by revealing the spa’s secrets and its eels to really elaborate on this point.
A CURE FOR WELLNESS does well with the grotesque scenes, but the actual plot is a little long winded. At the beginning of the film Lockhart finds a bug in his glass of water, but then it takes us nearly two hours to find out why. There is an annoying back story that pops up every now and then which has little relevance to the storyline and the final scene is – dare I say it- laughable.
A CURE FOR WELLNESS has its pitfalls but Verbinski pulls it off using style and some cleverly placed camera shots. Which despite some of the grotesque scenes, it’s actually quite beautiful.
Just whatever you do, don’t drink the water, because you’ll likely find some eels in there too.
Verdict
