Ari Aster’s Eddington is basically pure insanity committed to film. A satirical “comedy” set to the back drop of 2020’s America. It manages to compassionately explore and savagely rip apart all political & social sides of many major ploitical & social events of 2020. The film explores & critiques; libertarianism, police corruption, covid lockdown restrictions, conspiracy theories, BLM, & white saviour complex. I will be 100% honest; people are going struggle with this film. I certainly did. I can imagine Eddington; has and is going upset a lot of people! It really holds a mirror up to how divided America can be! One can only hope this film will make people from different groups have important discussions & bring about more unity however I feel it may do the opposite, but perhaps being a fan of Ari Aster films & Cormac Macarthy’s books has just left my outlook on life as pessimistic.
In it’s ideals, satire & some of its humour, Eddington’s almost Southpark-esque. In it’s execution it’s a brutally intense & violent Western that has left me reeling in so many ways.
As with all of Ari Aster’s films it has blown me away, the cast & acting is fantastic & the cinematography is brilliant. I thought the film was very powerful and had a lot to say, however with any good conscience I can’t say it’s enjoyable. Eddington is basically cinematic induced trauma; a film version of doom scrolling. Almost poetic as an over riding theme of all of Ari Aster’s films is stagnation by trauma.
This film is impossible for me to rate/score. All I’ll say is it’s a powerful piece of cinema that everyone should probably see but proceed with caution. It’s going to effect you and you probably aren’t going to enjoy it.
Next I shall discuss themes of the Character’s & the ending. SPOILERS AHEAD.
Eddington is a stark look at how divided America is and how, isolation & social media bubbles only go on to enforce further division. In this film phones & the internet are as deadly as guns. To quote Ari Aster; In an interview with Denton
Record Chronicle, Ari explains why he made this movie and why the characters are as they are. “We’re all living in different realities and we’re not reachable to each other at all. It’s very easy to demonize each other, but the fact is that we have been successfully divided. This is a movie about a bunch of people who care about the world and feel that something is very wrong, but they’re all looking at the world through different distorted strange windows and they all disagree on what that thing is.”
All the character’s listed below whenever you see them on their phone; their social media feed only reflects & entrenches their point of view further, emphasising the point made by Ari Aster in the above quote.
Joe Cross (Joaquin Phoenix): Joe is the sheriff of Eddington, New Mexico, who becomes embroiled in a political rivalry with the incumbent mayor. His character embodies a mix of paranoia and libertarian beliefs, leading him to defy state mandates during the pandemic. Joe’s complex personality is marked by his struggles with control and morality, making him both a tragic and terrifying figure in the film.
Ted Garcia (Pedro Pascal): Ted is the mayor of Eddington, portrayed as a composed and technocratic leader. He supports public health measures and faces challenges from Joe’s campaign. Ted’s character also represents the left embracing and enforcing Covid restrictions while not necessarily adhering to them themselves. As the film progresses we soon learn Ted is not going to be the hero and ultimately is snarky and self entitled. Ted is also used as a scape goat figure by Joe & Dawn to blame for Louise’s mental condition, which is not the case.
Louise Cross (Emma Stone): Louise is Joe’s emotionally fragmented wife, caught between her husband’s & mother, Dawn’s radical beliefs and her own vulnerabilities. Her character adds depth to the narrative, especially as she interacts with her conspiracy-theorist mother and becomes involved with a cult leader. The theme of stagnation by trauma is what is happening to Louise. Louise hints in many ways that her father was sexually abusive. This has led to severe mental issues, disabling her from maturing into womanhood appropriately, stitching the eerie dolls we see throughout the film and struggling to form new healthy relationships, her prior & current love interests being Ted & Joe.
Dawn (Deirdre O’Connell): Dawn is Louise’s mother, characterized by her conspiracy-driven mindset. Her influence on Louise and her interactions with Joe highlight the film’s themes of misinformation and paranoia.
Vernon Jefferson Peak (Austin Butler): Vernon represents those cultlike conspiracy theory groups that emerge in the midst of socio-political division. These groups become a place where those who feel hurt, unheard, or silenced can find their voice or sense of belonging. At the Canon press interview, Austin Butler mentioned how Aster told him that the character of Vernon represents the internet as a whole. And that’s exactly what the internet does. It gives us a sense of belonging in the most bizarre and sometimes false ways.
Michael (Micheal Ward): Michael a black police officer is used throughout the film by the opposing political ideals as a pawn. He is not safe from any group even the police force he works for. I feel he represents the struggles of the black community in America as a whole.
Butterfly Jimenez (David Midthunder): Officer Jimenez is involved in the investigation surrounding Joe’s actions, adding another layer to the film’s exploration of authority and justice.
Guy (Luke Grimes): A member of the sheriff’s office, Guy supports Joe’s campaign and represents the law enforcement perspective in the unfolding political drama.
Sarah (Amélie Hoeferle) | Eric Garcia Ted’s Son (Gomez Hidaka) | Brian (Cameron Mann) : Represent the young slightly naïve left, with the exception of Eric they represent to some extent, White Saviour complex. Eric being a Person of Colour has a much more grounded and justified argument to the social issues explored in the film however being young & heavily influenced by his father would rather antagonise the situations rather than have open discussions.
Homeless Man (Clifton Collins Jr) : Most likely represents the overall insanity of the film and the political division; when we first encounter him he is crazily arguing with himself setting up the theme of division that runs throughout the film.
Themes of the ending.
The ending of Eddington is horrendously violent. Joe having lost complete control of his love & home life, political campaign & having been humiliated by Ted, kills the homeless man, snipes Ted & his son, Eric in their home & unsuccessfully covers up his killing spree. Butterfly Jimenez is on his case. As a way out Joe decides to frame Michael. Following this an unknown group enters the town frees the framed Michael only to use him as bait to kill off the rest of police force.
It must be said the violence in this sequence is severe, Michael is caught in an explosion, the shrapnel shredding his face. Guy is blown to pieces. Butterfly Jimenez has his leg torn off by sustained gun fire before further shots explode the top of his head. Joe Cross is chased down by one of the group & stabbed through the head with a hunting knife. He some how miraculously survives but sustains severe brain damage. Brian manages to gun down the attackers while filming on his phone. Here the violence ends.
The group behind the attack has no dialogue and no defining factors, they are an unknown chaotic influence. After they are defeated the film shows phone footage from a right wing media outlet, according to this coverage “antifa” is to blame for the attack. However this does not seem to be the case. For one the “antifa super soldiers” show up in a private jet; on the tail wing is a logo of a hand holding a globe, perhaps a symbolisation that a larger group that is actually pulling the strings. It is important to note although the plane is full of BLM signs that every member of the plane is white & have military grade tech ranging from weapons to drones. This very much feels like a staged CIA type coup as historically proven time & time again in William Blum’s book, Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions since World War II. To entrench this idea further once the super soldiers job is done; causing as much chaos & destruction as possible the data centre, Goldmagikarp is heralded in.
Following the aftermath of the violence the town is under the control of a vegetive Joe Cross (he is finally mayor, perhaps a comment on America’s trend at present of electing mentally deteriorating old men) who is being puppeteered by not only the data centre representatives but also his QAnon leaning Mother in law. This also seems to conclude the theme throughout the film that big tech is the enemy & cause of division in America as a whole. It also feels like a nod to IBM providing technology and training to the South African government and military during the apartheid era, including equipment for administrative purposes like payroll and population records, which was used to perpetuate racial segregation.
If this doesn’t feel grim enough the ending of the film shows what has become of the other surviving characters, Brian is now heralded by the right wing media as a hero completely changing his views & values earlier in the film. Louise is pregnant by Vernon signifying the child will be brought into an extremely unhealthy belief system. Michael is the new sheriff and is seen doing target practice deep in the desert indicating that the cycle of violence is likely to continue.
The outro of the film is accompanied beautifully with the song Courtyard by Bobby Gentry with lyrics about broken promises, superficial forms of love, and longing for true connection. All major themes and experiences for our many main characters.
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