Rumours Review: LFF 2024
Cate Blanchett and Charles Dance lead surreal horror comedy Rumours
If 2024 is the year of unexpected subjects being made into musicals then it is also the year of surprising Cate Blanchett roles – though Rumours, a comedy from surrealist Canadian filmmakers Guy Maddin and brothers Evan and Galen Johnson is nowhere near as wild a choice as the awful Borderlands adaption.
It tells the story of a meeting of the G7 – the leaders of the world’s seven most financially powerful nations – who after posing for a photo op at an archaeological dig site in Germany sit down together to draft a joint statement about an unnamed global crisis. There are more than just political vagaries getting in the way of their work though, as soon after sitting down the politicians notice that absolutely everyone else has vanished in dangerous, possibly apocalyptic circumstances. Left to fend for themselves and figure out what has happened, the seven are soon being stalked by something that’s been hiding in the woods.
Rumours draws much of its humour from pointing out the obvious uselessness of its powerful characters when faced with an actual literal crisis and much more from playing on national stereotypes. Each of the actors is clearly having fun with their respective leaders; Cate Blanchett’s German Chancellor is a micromanaging pragmatist and clearly based on Angela Merkel, Roy Dupuis’ man bun sporting Canadian PM sensitive and insecure and clearly desired by all the women. Denis Menochet’s French President is a pompous intellectual, Rolando Ravello’s Italian PM clueless and underprepared and Charles’ Dance President of the USA elderly and self-interested. Sound familiar?
Watching them riff off each other ekes out a good number of laughs in the opening half of the film before things get well and truly weird as the crisis our characters are plunged into takes a horrific, supernatural turn. Though some scenes are a bit creepy, the atmosphere is high camp and there are moments of interaction that felt like they could have been lifted right out of Garth Marenghi’s Dark Place. There are masturbating zombies, a paedophile hunting AI and a brain the size of a hatchback – Rumours really defies explanation.
The spooky vibes are all captured in classic B-movie fashion with endless fog that seems out of nowhere and heavy use of green and purple lighting. You constantly feel as if something is going to crawl out of the swamp – and you’re right. It does.
The longer the story goes on though the less it feels like it matters who these characters are. We start to lose the very elements that made them interesting, as they are just seven people trying to escape their situation rather than the leaders of the free world. What could have been a very incisive satire is given up for a schlocky, surrealist monster movie. Though we do get a few more excellent pollical gags at the end, it feels as though Rumours couldn’t quite decide what sort of film it was going to be or at least couldn’t stick to one idea for its full run time.
Still, it’s undeniably fun watching these world class actors interacting in such a silly film. Lovers of kitschy sci fi or horror movies are likely to have a good time, just don’t go in expecting Armando Iannucci levels of political satire. Rumours is a bizarre romp through the global political landscape, worryingly reminding us just how fucked we all are if the zombie apocalypse ever really comes.
Rumours is playing as part of the BFI London Film Festival 2024. It will be released in UK cinemas on 6th December 2024
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