In the unlikely event that our planet ends and a superior extraterrestrial society discovers our pop culture and tries to figure out why everyone is talking about Emma Stone, we now have the movie clip they ought to see.
It won’t be difficult to translate Earth language because she isn’t even speaking. She’s just doing some dancing. It’s toward the conclusion of her most recent collaboration with Yorgos Lanthimos, “Kinds of Kindness,” a difficult, captivating, confusing, if not plain frustratingly opaque piece. Stone is performing a fantastic improvised victory dance. It’s evident that the Stone-Lanthimos duo, in their third feature film together, is fostering a quality in Stone that increasingly distinguishes her: her fearlessness and the evident joy it brings her.
However, it’s also plausible that the reason we adore this scene so much is because we’re already thirsty (the movie’s central subject, but let’s set that aside for the moment) and are looking for a little happiness. The song “Kinds of Kindness” lacks both substance and beauty, in contrast to Lanthimos’ stunning period pieces “The Favourite” and the opulent “Poor Things” from the previous year. Furthermore, there isn’t any discernible kindness to be found. The key word here is discernible. This may be the title’s main idea. or not.
What, then, are “Kinds of Kindness”? Alright, let’s get started. Working with screenwriter Efthimis Filippou (“The Lobster”) for a fifth time, Lanthimos has produced a triptych, or three short films featuring the same actors. A strong cast of Lanthimos mainstays makes an appearance, including Joe Alwyn, Margaret Qualley, Hong Chau, Jesse Plemons, who won the best actor prize at Cannes, and one of the most unique actors in the universe, Willem Dafoe, who is returning to Stone’s Bella from “Poor Things.”
Together, these three nearly three-hour-long pieces tell three distinct storylines featuring distinct individuals, with a central theme best understood by analyzing the lyrics of a Eurythmics song.
Lanthimos opens his film with the famous song, “Sweet dreams are made of this.” What’s more, some of them wish to take advantage of you. A few of them desire to be utilized by you. A few of them desire to mistreat you. A few of them desire to be mistreated.” Yes, all of these things take place in “Kinds of Kindness,” a contemplation on our free will and the ways that we voluntarily cede it to others in the family, at work, and in religion. Something about being controlled by someone else gives all these characters a sick feeling of comfort.
The opening scene, which is by far the tightest, funniest, and most powerful, has our main character, Robert (Plemons), who works for a dubious company owned by Raymond (Dafoe), who has complete control over everything Robert does.
And we really do mean everything. What he wears, consumes, and when he has sex are all carefully considered, as is the location of his home with his wife, whom he also hand-picked. Robert is okay with Raymond making all the decisions because it even earns him cool gifts like a broken John McEnroe racket. That is, until he is asked to essentially commit manslaughter.
He performs poorly and gets let go. Then, he develops an obsession with doing whatever it takes to win back his boss’s favor.
Forty minutes into the film, Stone shows up as a cog in the same machine. However, she steals the show in the next film as Liz, the devoted spouse of suburban police officer Daniel (Plemons, but with lighter hair). Scientist Liz, to continue with the Eurythmics lyrics, “traveled the world and the seven seas” before disappearing during a sea voyage.
