Streaming: Elisabeth Moss in Her Smell – not to be sniffed at

Moss thrills as a strung-out rock star in Alex Ross Perry’s tremendous, terribly titled new film

A bad title can be a debilitating handicap to even the best of films: if it makes you wince even to say the thing, it’s that much harder to get invested in watching it. This is a truth that has been learned the hard way by the new film from American independent writer-director Alex Ross Perry: a daring, grungily immersive and quite brilliantly acted character study that has been saddled, for reasons best known to Perry himself, with the buzz-killing moniker Her Smell.

Try telling people, as I have for several months now, that they should be looking out for a terrific film called Her Smell – only to be greeted with grimacing, nose-wrinkling, “her what?” questions and often a swift change of subject. It hasn’t courted much of a crowd: after premiering to strong reviews at the Toronto film festival a year ago, the film eventually secured a tiny release in the States, grossing just over $250,000. UK distributors were particularly slow to bite: finally, Her Smell (Signature, 15) is being released directly to video on demand on Monday, skipping a traditional cinema release. I’m not saying that low profile is all down to the title – the film’s abrasive and challenging in more substantial ways – but it can’t have helped.

In any case, I implore you to overlook the title, not the film, which is so hell-for-leather in its close-up study of a fictitious female rock star – played with thrilling, strung-out bravado by Elisabeth Moss – that you feel a little punch-drunk watching it. It shows up so many musical biopics in the Bohemian Rhapsody vein as the gutless cosplay exercises they are. In case you’re wondering, the olfactory system plays no obvious role in the film, though you can pretty much imagine how Becky Something (Moss) smells as the film introduces her in a mood-swinging backstage frenzy of post-concert adrenaline: sweat, sex and substances, and not in a particularly inviting way.

Becky is the frontwoman of a popular all-girl punk band coming apart at the seams, mostly because she’s coming apart herself. The way Moss plays her, as a whirligig of ego, anger, untended talent and self-loathing, makes Courtney Love look like Taylor Swift. Perry’s film charts Becky’s self-destruction, self-reckoning and tentative self-renewal in five kinetic, unstinting acts, with a kind of updated, pressed-to-the-glass John Cassavetes energy. At over two hours, its deep emotional payoff feels hard-won. Moss should be up for every award going at the year’s end; she almost certainly won’t be.

Watch a trailer for Her Smell.

Perry, for his part, is growing into one of American cinema’s most adventurous, exciting young film-makers, even as UK distributors have largely gone off him. His excellent last film, the wistful but strychnine-laced New York ensemble piece Golden Exits – another less than enticing title – also went straight to streaming here.

Finally, while we’re considering the fates of festival films, this week’s column comes to you from the Venice film festival, where critics are swooning and/or arguing over such big autumn attractions as Todd Phillips’s Joker and Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story. If you want a taste of the programme’s less starry side, however, Venice has again teamed up with Festival Scope to launch the Sala Web, where a handful of this year’s sidebar entries are available to stream at home, for the equivalent of €4 each, until 19 September. Take a chance on Tunisian film The Scarecrows, an emotionally raw study of women escaping sex slavery on the Syrian front, or the intriguing, experimental Spanish memory piece Zumiriki. There’s every chance they won’t turn up farther down the road.

Also new to DVD and streaming

Watch a trailer for High Life.

High Life
(Thunderbird, 18)
Claire Denis may be our greatest working auteur, and her first English-language film shores up that claim: an exquisitely apocalyptic sci-fi nightmare, spiked with visceral sexuality and body horror.

Long Shot
(Lionsgate, 15)
An odd-couple romcom that bombed cinemas but deserves a second life. Charlize Theron and Seth Rogen have surprisingly sparky chemistry as a swannish presidential candidate and her schlubby speechwriter.

Only You
(Curzon, 15)
Harry Wootliff’s polished, autumnal debut is an essentially traditional relationship drama about a Glasgow couple struggling to conceive, but actors Laia Costa and Josh O’Connor lend it special emotional ballast.

Beats
(Altitude, 15)
Centred on two Scottish lads united by small-town ennui and a love of techno, Brian Welsh’s 90s-set coming-of-age tale is a euphoric treat for rave-era nostalgists and a scrappy charmer for everyone else.

Contributor

Guy Lodge

The GuardianTramp

Related Content

Article image
Streaming: the best rock star films
From Velvet Goldmine to Sound of Metal, the rock’n’roll life has provided a rich seam for cinema

Guy Lodge

29, May, 2021 @7:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: anyone for tennis?
From Strangers on a Train to Match Point, the two-way, sunstruck intensity of the game is made for cinema

Guy Lodge

03, Jul, 2021 @7:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: the best films about artists
From Wim Wenders’ recent Anselm Kiefer documentary to Kirk Douglas’s tortured Van Gogh and Derek Jarman’s erotic ode to Caravaggio, cinema loves a brush with genius

Guy Lodge

10, Feb, 2024 @8:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: the best films about writers
Elisabeth Moss’s fevered turn as American gothic novelist Shirley Jackson is the latest chapter in cinema’s tireless quest to dramatise the literary life

Guy Lodge

02, Jan, 2021 @8:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: the Queen in film
Cinematic portrayals of Her Majesty span psychological depths and gleeful farce, from The King’s Speech to The Naked Gun

Guy Lodge

04, Jun, 2022 @7:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: the best movie portrayals of US presidents
How long before a Donald Trump biopic? From Obama to Lincoln, some White House incumbents fare better than others on the big screen

Guy Lodge

23, Jan, 2021 @8:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: The Phantom of the Open and the best underdog sports films
Mark Rylance’s pitch-perfect turn as the worst golfer in the Open’s history follows in the slipstream of valiant loser dramas, from Rocky and Slap Shot to Cool Runnings

Guy Lodge

23, Jul, 2022 @7:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: Beyoncé’s Homecoming
The singer’s exhilarating Homecoming documentary is a fascinating study in celebrity

Guy Lodge

29, Apr, 2019 @7:00 AM

Article image
Streaming: curate your own Spike Jonze mini-season
The director’s new Beastie Boys doc is the latest twist in a singular career. What better time to seek out his best work online...

Guy Lodge

25, Apr, 2020 @7:00 AM

Article image
Demolition; Ratchet & Clank; Golden Years; Sid and Nancy; Hangmen Also Die!; People of the Mountains – review
Widowed banker Jake Gyllenhaal takes a hammer to his past in a week dominated by reissues, among them Alex Cox’s feral Sid Vicious film

Guy Lodge

28, Aug, 2016 @7:00 AM