Initially, the combination of Robert Pattinson and A24 was intriguing to me. Not only did it present me with the opportunity to see the actor who had made Oscar buzz with his recent filmography, but for one of those films to be produced by A24 proved beneficial enough for a bargain bin purchase.
The narrative of High Life focuses on Monte (Pattinson), one of many criminals sentenced to labor aboard a space ship hurtling towards a black hole. It’s a longline that provides a number of thoughts upon pressing play, although the majority of them are never really justified. Instead, the film’s first two acts digress towards a bizarrely erotic narrative revolving around the ship’s nurse (also a criminal) desperately wanting to give birth to a child, despite all sexual activity being banned on the ship. This, unfortunately, drives the films core narrative and undermines interesting ideas that the film briefly touches upon. One of these areas being the differing attitudes of the prisoners on board.
While the majority become increasingly erratic, Tcherny (André Benjamin) is the other character we can resonate with. He finds solace in the ship’s garden, which reminds him of Earth, and regularly opens up to Monte about his life there and what he misses. Likewise, Monte’s arc concerns his raising of a child in this hostile environment. These two particular arcs presented a range of interesting narratives to explore, although were squandered by High Life’s main narrative - with Tcherny receiving a short amount of screen time as a result.
Benjamin’s performance, along with Pattinson’s, are wholly what kept me watching - I was intrigued by their narratives and where they could end up. However, I felt the opposite about the other prisoners, who embrace their criminal instincts from the start. By comparison, while there is some effective acting from those playing the characters, their lack of introspection bars you from resonating with them. As such, their persistent criminality throughout didn’t make me consider where else the character could head other than experiencing the consequences of such misbehaviour.
High Life’s narrative shifts in the film’s final act, focusing on Monte’s fragile relationship with his daughter. While some of it caters to one of the narrative possibilities I mentioned earlier, the reality of it’s presentation comes off as a teenager having mood swings at a largely ignorant father. While I spent the majority of the film interested in Monte’s arc, this payoff felt long-winded and generally disappointing, as if the main film had finished and this was the aftermath.
On the whole, High Life didn’t feel overly coherent to me. While the film presents some strong performances and interesting narrative ideas, the majority of those ideas get lost in a very odd narrative with an inadequate conclusion. The majority of its character writing is predictable and simmers down to a squabble between two characters in its final act, neglecting the exploration of more introspective narratives.