Cannes #78 - “Eddington” Review

Remember the days when a sneeze was more feared than a gunshot? Ari Aster surely does, and Eddington is his chaotic love letter to those unhinged, hand-sanitised months. Set during the early Covid lockdown, the film isn’t really about the virus: it’s about what happens when mass hysteria, meme culture, and small-town ambition collide in a dusty corner of New Mexico and go absolutely feral.

For a filmmaker obsessed with paranoia, fear, and dark humour, the absurdly enforced safety norms provide an ideal playground, with six feet of mandated social distance offering the perfect staging for Aster’s twisted choreography.

Joaquin Phoenix stars as Joe Cross, the incompetent sheriff of Sevilla County, who views a face mask not as a public health measure but as a direct assault on his starred-and-striped freedom. Spotting kindred spirits in his unmasked neighbours, he seizes the moment, launching a wobbly campaign for mayor and transforming into the poster boy for America’s right-wing fever dream.

But Aster doesn’t let the other side off the hook either, as white teenagers riot against their own privilege, lost in a vortex of performative outrage. His mockery is direct, his vision exaggerated, but the satire often feels more like a laundry list of contemporary chaos than a pointed critique. The craziness is accurate; the commentary, less so.

The first half plays like a cursed Twitter thread brought to life: anti-maskers, conspiracy theorists, and BLM protesters all swirl together in a soup of satire and surface-level hot takes. But then, halfway through, the film mutates—into something bolder, weirder, and far more interesting. It stops regurgitating headlines and starts remixing them with actual imagination.

And then there’s Emma Stone. Present, technically. Mostly relegated to the background, quietly reminding us she deserves much better than a thankless third-fiddle role.

Eddington is ambitious, bizarre, and tonally unstable— but maybe that’s the whole point. Still, one question lingers: is it too late for pandemic satire… or too soon?

3/5