Under the Skin “Less Than Skin Deep”

“Hotshots” looks at a movie!

UNDER THE SKIN is a strange movie that has been getting good reviews, but the reviews I have read give away the ending, which explains all the confusing events in the movie.

That is like reading the last few pages of a novel to see how it ends before reading the novel the way the author intended it to be read.

As a matter of fact, this movie is based on the novel by Michael Faber, which I have not read, and so I do not know how it was constructed or if the reader doesn’t get an explanation for what is happening until the very end like the movie.

Scarlett Johannson stars as a woman who is not given a name, even in the credits, where she could have been listed as “The Woman.”

In fact, none of the actors are identified by names, which makes it difficult to talk about them.

The movie begins with someone riding a motorcycle at night on a deserted road. A man stops by the side of the road, gets off the motorcycle, and retrieves a woman’s body and carries it to a white van parked on the road.

Then we see a naked woman against a white background undress another woman who is lying still and put on that woman’s clothes, stopping to examine an ant that she finds on the woman’s body.

The woman then drives away in the van and thus begins a series of similar scenes, in which she stops to ask men for directions, offers them a ride, and then seduces them.

All of these scenes end with Scarlett Johannson, whom we now recognize as the woman, undressed and walking on top of a body of water, while the man, also undressed, walks into the water and submerges.

This all takes place in Scotland, and we see the same scene with variations during the day and night with different men.

One variation is in a nightclub when she lets a man pick her up with the line, “I’m all alone, you’re all alone.”

She continues picking up men and seducing and drowning them, but not always by giving them a ride in the van.

And then there is that scene at the end which explains everything.

UNDER THE SKIN is less than skin deep–much less.

I’m Dan Culberson and this is “Hotshots.”