A Different Man

Year 17, Day 151 - 5/31/25 - Movie #5,034

BEFORE: It's another month in the can, so here are my format stats for May 2025:

11 Movies watched on cable (saved to DVD): A Scanner Darkly, Citizen Ruth, The Last Movie Star, Stroker Ace, The End, Stay Hungry, Not Without My Daughter, Norma Rae, Stop-Loss, 10 Years, A Different Man

6 watched on Netflix: Trial By Fire, End of the Road, The Equalizer 3, Nyad, Venom: The Last Dance, Havoc (2025)

1 watched on iTunes: Havoc (2005)
1 watched on Amazon Prime: The Benefactor
1 watched on Hulu: The Secret Life of Bees

1 watched on Disney+: Captain America: Brave New World

1 watched in theaters: Thunderbolts

22 TOTAL

Now, I had two paths out of "Thunderbolts", if I discarded any link that led to either a horror film, romance film, or a Christmas film. This is a pretty standard way for me to narrow down my choices, though these films aren't completely off-limits, as I did program a horror film for next week, just one that doesn't connect to any other horror films, but DOES connect to my June plans. But still, it came down to either following the Florence Pugh link or the Sebastian Stan. I have three Florence Pugh films on the list, they may not be flat-out romance films but they seem a little relationship-oriented.  So I tried out the other path and managed to find links to my Father's Day material and then the Doc Block. So there's the choice, I'm watching a couple Sebastian Stan films instead.  

(Michael Shannon is in today's film, and he's in a film I marked as a possible Fathers Day film, but that would get me there too soon, Fathers Day isn't until June 15, it turns out.). Tomorrow I'll print the actor (and non-actor) links for June.

THE PLOT: An aspiring actor undergoes a radical medical procedure to drastically transform his appearance, but his new dream face quickly turns into a nightmare. 

AFTER: OK, let me back up a bit and see if I can properly explain this film's premise, because it does get rather complicated by the end. In real life there's an actor with a condition called neurofibromatosis, something in the old days we'd call a facial deformity, but now in the new age there's probably a push to call it "differently visaged" or "facially challenged". He got a job in the U.K. as some kind of TV presenter on a reality show called "Beauty and the Beast", which brought together people with disfigurements to meet people without them who were overly pre-occupied with their looks. He later appeared in a short film "The Pearson Twins" with his identical twin brother, only they're not really identical because the condition affects them in different ways. He made an appearance in that Scarlet Johansson film "Under the Skin", and was also on "Celebrity Masterchef" in the UK, though they appear to have a looser definition of "celebrity" there, because I only recognized a couple contestants, like that guy from "The Young Ones" who was also in a "Star Wars" movie, and Apl.de.Ap from the Black-Eyed Peas. 

So he's classified as an actor by the IMDB, most people in films are, even if they aren't doing any acting, like just talking in a documentary or something, IMDB uses the word because it's too hard to parse out when someone is doing something for real or not. But the lead character in this film has a similar condition, and he's played by Sebastian Stan, wearing a prosthetic to make it LOOK like he has a facial deformity. That's not too egregious, but he did kind of take the role away from a perhaps equally qualified actor WITH a deformity, but that's neither here nor there. The character he plays, Edward, also wants to be an actor, but the only work he can find in that arena is appearing in public service films about how people should treat those with conditions like neurofibromatosis, like if you have a co-worker that looks different than most people, you still need to interact with them and treat them like other humans, which means inviting them out to the bar when everyone else is going, and taking an interest in their personal lives.  

But, as you may imagine, there aren't too many PSA films on this topic made, pretty much if someone does their job well and makes the definitive industrial film about this, no need for another one. So Edward lives his life while waiting for other such opportunities to arise, in a small NYC apartment that's a fourth-floor walk-up with a leaky ceiling. There's a new tenant next door, Ingrid, an attractive woman who's a budding playwright, and they bond a little after her movers scratch up his front door with her furniture, and she has the door repainted very badly.  After they spend some time together, Edward develops feelings for Ingrid, only he's too nervous because of his appearance to take things to the next level. Meanwhile, he volunteers for an experimental treatment that could cure him of his condition, only who knows, he might be in the placebo group and nothing will happen at all. 

But after a few weeks, there are signs that something is happening, large chunks of his former face start to loosen, and over the course of a few painful days, his appearance is radically different, and a new face has emerged from beneath the old one, and after he manages to peel off a few layers of skin.  NOTE: I have no idea if this is medically possible, or if anything could happen this way, or if it should, it's not really PC here to say what's good or bad, but this is what we're told happens.  ANOTHER NOTE: I have not seen "The Substance" yet, though it's on my list, so I have no idea if THIS process is similar to the one in THAT movie, no spoilers, that one's not streaming yet, but who knows, maybe this is the male version of that story, I can't say for sure. This is just what we're told happens, so I'm working with that. 

Edward decides to not tell anyone that the treatment was a success, he decides to restart his life from scratch, change his name to "Guy" and if anyone asks what happened to Edward, well I guess he disappeared or committed suicide or something. Even when the doctors show up because Edward hasn't checked in, "Guy" says it's too late, he's missing, no, wait, he's dead and he got cremated so don't even bother trying to find his body. Anyway, it's my apartment now, so get out of here before I call the cops.  Sure, that tracks. 

Ingrid overhears that Edward has died, and then the film jumps forward a bit, to where Guy is living in a fantastic new apartment, wearing much nicer clothes, sleeping with hot women, and he's got a job in real-estate, and doing well - but he learns that Ingrid has written a play based on the life of her old next-door neighbor, a man with a facial deformity. "Guy" feels that old acting bug biting him again, so he auditions for the park, wearing a mask that was cast from his former face. He knows the character because he lived life as that person, so naturally he gets the part. It's presumed that he will wear the mask for most of the play, and then when the Ingrid character falls in love with him, he'll lose the mask so the audience can see him as she does, as a handsome man with no faults. So the play-within-the-film is kind of a microcosm of the film itself, in both cases the handsome actor wears a mask and then he doesn't.  

"Guy" and Ingrid fall into a relationship, or a situationship, and this means they both finally get what they wanted, even if Ingrid isn't aware of it. Edward wanted to sleep with Ingrid, only he didn't have the nerve, and Ingrid wanted to sleep with Edward, only she didn't have the time.  Oh, but it doesn't end there, we're just getting started...

Oswald appears on the scene, he's an actor with a real facial deformity (played by Adam Pearson, the actor with the real facial deformity) and he's nice enough, well-spoken, and very outgoing. He's everything that "Guy" is not, because regardless of the change to his appearance, Guy is still nervous and indecisive, reclusive and filled with self-doubt - you could say that maybe years of bullying and ridicule made him this way, or perhaps the point being made here is that you can change your appearance, but that won't change who you are on the inside. Guy tries his best to change, but deep down once he's successful and in the spotlight it seems he's not prepared to handle it. 

While Guy has trouble remembering his lines, Oswald is still hanging around, and he knows the lines backwards and forwards. Oswald is also charming and outgoing, and has some thoughts about the transformation scenes - meanwhile the process of creating a workable prosthetic for Guy to look like Edward (again) is also proving to be problematic.  So it's determined that Oswald should play Edward for most of the play, and if Guy can learn to do a British accent, he can just play Edward at the end, after the "Beauty and the Beast" like transformation, which again is only a metaphor to most people, even though it really happened for Edward/Guy. 

This all doesn't sit well with Guy, because Oswald is also spending more and more time with Ingrid, and he's spending less and less. He becomes jealous and starts stalking Oswald, and then he snaps and starts wearing the mask of his old face at his real-estate job, and that's turning off the clients.  After he interrupts the play one night and accuses Oswald of stealing his job, his girlfriend and his spotlight, we just know things are not going to end well, you know these love triangles rarely do.  This is described online as a dark comedy, but I'm not so sure about that, nothing's really funny about someone feeling like their life is turning to crap, especially after being given an opportunity to improve it, which they just didn't handle well. (See also "Beau Is Afraid")

Perhaps it's too raw for me, two months ago I left a job I held for 31 years, it just became too much, feeling like nothing I was doing to keep the company in business was working. No matter what I accomplished, the boss never thanked me or said I did a good job, and no matter how much money I raised in art sales or at comic-cons, the money would be spent on the company's outstanding debts and we'd be back to square one. Finally I just had to get out of there because I figured there just had to be a better way to spend my time and not be so stressed out 24/7. This morning I had a stress dream, though, so I was kind of back at the job for a couple hours, trying to raise money and then (in the dream) the boss bought all new office furniture and computers with money he didn't have, so before I could talk to him I put on my jacket and walked out. The stress is still with me, but my point is that sometimes you just need to burn your situation to the ground (not literally) and GTFO. 

"Guy" stuck around way too long here, and he watched everything that meant anything get taken from him, just because another person was more outgoing and enthusiastic. This is sad and somewhat relatable, but I'd still hesitate to use the word "comedy".  Again, no spoilers about how the real Edward / the new "Guy" fares in the end, but hey, at least there's a resolution of sorts. You can change what you look like, you can change your situation, but to a large extent, you can't change who you are at heart. Is that the message?  Anyway, at least there's a lot to think about here. 

Directed by Aaron Schimberg

Also starring Renate Reinsve (last seen in "The Worst Person in the World"), Adam Pearson (last seen in "Under the Skin"), C. Mason Wells, Owen Kline (last seen in "Life as a House"), Charlie Korsmo (last seen in "Spielberg"), Patrick Wang, Michael Shannon (last seen in "The Bikeriders"), Miles G. Jackson (last seen in "The Wolf of Wall Street"), Neal Davidson, Marc Geller (last seen in "Stardust Memories"), James Foster Jr., JJ McGlone, Lawrence Arancio (last seen in "Puzzle"), Billy Griffith (last seen in "The Rewrite"), John Klacsmann, Cosmo Bjorkenheim, John Keating, Corey R. Taylor, Danielle Burgos, Sammy Mena, Jon Dieringer, Malachi Weir (last seen in "Birdman"), David Joseph Regelmann, Nina White, Dena Winter, Peter D. Straus, Cameron Steinfeld, Marley Ficalora, Doug Barron (last seen in "The Yards"), Stephee Bonifacio, Allan Anthony Smith, Trenton Hudson, Sean Berman, Annelise Ogaard, Juney Smith, Lucy Kaminsky (last seen in "Together Together"), Jarvis Tomdio, Karoline, Liana Runcie, Bruce Kitzmeyer, Martin Ewens, Eleanore Pienta, Hanna Edizel, Christopher Spurrier,

RATING: 6 out of 10 whistling instructional videos