Velvet Buzzsaw

New to Netflix within the last couple weeks is a very intriguingly-named film, Velvet Buzzsaw. 

That name is immediately striking in and of itself because of the contradiction between the soft supple feel of velvet that reassures you of comfort and the hard, edged blade of a buzz--

Sorry I was off being pretentious again. Dear, dear, I couldn't help myself!

Based in the uber-snotty art world where anything is art, yet nothing is art, and taste seems to be defined on how many Thesaurus words you can string together, Velvet Buzzsaw follows a simple, yet darkly humorous story that, in all honesty probably didn't need to be a film as opposed to a high-quality Black Mirror episode. 

Featuring the reuniting of Jake Gyllenhaal, whom everyone seems to love these days, and director Dan Gilroy, I was looking forward to this one doing for the art scene what their previous film, Nightcrawler, did for the TMZ-esque media scene. That film was one of the best of that year (2014) and gave Gyllenhaal one of his best performances to date.

Would/could Velvet Buzzsaw live up to that level? 

Unfortunately it seems that the answer is no, though Velvet Buzzsaw definitely isn't a bad film. But it is one that makes it a very hard sell: watching a bunch of hoity-toity art snobs run around, trying to solve a mystery, as art itself begins to murder them. Not much at all really makes sense in this film, and I suppose that's part of its charm, but it also forces it to be so light and airy that it doesn't hit quite as hard as Nightcrawler did. Oddly enough, given that it's on Netflix, it does seem to play out almost like a TV movie in nearly every way other than acting and special effects. It feels decidedly low budget (which is fine) but also technically just "okay". There's no fantastic cinematography, no creepy or pounding original score, and the editing/pacing does - like I said - feel like it should have been a more condensed, albeit high-profile, Black Mirror episode. 

"Do you like my French tuck? Learned it from Tan"

The art stuff and connections in the film didn't really work for me mainly because it drives me mad that people like that actually exist out there and get paid for it. Which I guess made it all the more humorous when the art they "find" from a dead man begins to kill them one by one. It's in these moments that the film knows exactly what it's doing and are the best bits of the film, so much so that the in between scenes start to feel like a drag until we get to the next death. Outside of worrying about the mystery, there sincerely isn't much that happens in the film other than an odd romance between a wait-I-thought-he-was-gay Gyllenhaal and the girl who finds the paintings, Josephina. These deaths escalate in creativity throughout the film with some being fairly typical and mundane with others being quite creative and darkly humorous.

What is the children's movie where this
(paint "melting" and chasing) happens
in the library? Someone tell me,
I can't remember

The best part about Velvet Buzzsaw is the cast and it's clear they're having fun. Gyllenhaal is a blast to watch and in some scenes his character is so verbosely ridiculous that it looks like he's about to burst out laughing. Rene Russo gets almost equal amount of screen time it seems and is also a fun character to watch navigate the art world. John Malkovich stops by in a mostly useless character role (but he's fun) and a handful of other famous faces show up too. After how incredible he was in Blindspotting, Daveed Diggs being all but ignored is pretty sad though.

This is obviously one of those "quick reviews" because there isn't too much else to say about Velvet Buzzsaw. It's semi-disappointing given the level of build-up I feel like there was with the reuniting of Gilroy/Gyllenhaal and the Sundance premiere, but it's also only releasing on Netflix so perhaps I should have tempered my expectations. Again, it's a hard sell for me to outright recommend even though I enjoyed it for what it was (art horror genre, anyone?) but I wouldn't be surprised to hear people say they didn't enjoy it or ended up on their phones the whole runtime. 

CONS

• Feels a bit like a TV movie, mainly from the technical side. Nothing really wows where some iconic cinematography and music could have elevated this film considerably
• Does anyone really care about this population of people in the art scene? They're the worst
• Starts to get repetitive and dull between the deaths
• Daveed Diggs gets almost nothing to do

PROS

• Gyllenhaal seems to be having a ton of fun and is a delight to watch 
• Remainder of cast is fitting for their roles. Russo is probably the other MVP
• Increasingly fun and visually captivating death scenes
• Moves along decently quick -- easy watching

Rath's Review Score | 6/10