Ari Aster’s America with Covid, mask off and reeling
The latest from art house horror darling Ari Aster, like his last outing, “Beau is Afraid” (2023), isn’t quite the occult blood-and-guts fest one has come to expect from an auteur of the macabre (“Hereditary,” “Midsommar”). But it is an American horror story to be certain. Set in the fictional Southwestern town of the title, “Eddington” takes place during the height of the Covid pandemic, with ripple effects of George Floyd’s murder and the Black Lives Matter movement factoring large into the equation. Eddington is a small, financially struggling New Mexican town of 2,000 that abuts a Pueblo Indian reservation. Beau, I mean Joaquin Phoenix, plays Joe Cross, the county sheriff who, despite orders from the governor and mayor (Pedro Pascal, who seems to be popping up everywhere), refuses to wear a mask. He’s not an antivaxxer or Covid denier per se, but close enough – and as a result, decides to challenge Pascal’s smooth and composed Ted Garcia for his mayoral seat.
The pratfalls and ills of social media and social politics drive the film for nearly two-thirds of its two and a half hours. It’s imbued with the shaggy-dog docudrama vibe of a Richard Linklater or Paul Thomas Anderson film, sans the slack, droll wit. Some of the satire on white privilege, however, lands quite cuttingly, especially as one pasty young man (Cameron Mann) shouting from a podium tells reluctant listeners that he’s become an antiracist and is ready to sit down and listen to others, but only after he’s had his time at the mic to “racesplain.” Also in focus is Cross’ Black deputy (Michael Ward) as BLM protesters jam the streets, and the sovereignty of the Pueblo Peoples and their lines of jurisdiction overlap with Cross’ and become a point of contention during a murder investigation. On all pointed matters (social media, race and pandemic policy), both sides get their due without a lean – that’s left to the audience.
Much of what’s baked in is from what we lived not so long ago, and it goes on too long. But Phoenix, fully embracing his character’s sociopolitical foibles, makes it watchable; we also get Cross’ strangely aloof wife, Louise (Emma Stone, most wildly underused), crafting eerie Etsy dolls Tim Burton would relish; a conspiracy theory-obsessed mother-in-law (Deirdre O’Connell, nuanced and fantastic in the quirky role); and a handsomely gaunt Austin Butler (“Elvis”) channeling his inner Johnny Depp as Vernon Jefferson Peak, a TikTok-propelled cult leader who gets his hooks into Louise as she struggles to come to terms with veiled past traumas.
In “Midsommar,” “Heredity” and even “Beau,” there were subtly sown seeds of disruption to come. Here, Eddington erupts abruptly into chaotic violence – all because of Katy Perry’s “Fireworks.” It’s a gonzo perk-you-up that serves up equal shares of jaw-drop awe and pull-you-out-of-it WTFs. It doesn’t quite hold together, but Phoenix, gamely taking on a physically taxing part, makes Cross the self-interested embodiment of the American psyche that’s more in line with the current president than our last. He’s conflicted, complex and holds the eye. The same is so for the township of Eddington, clearly class-stratified and looking to erect an energy-sucking data center while promising to go green and clean in the short future.
From the opening scene of a snot-drooling, mentally unwell vagrant charging through the streets, it’s clear as to what Aster wants to take his scalpel to. What’s unclear is what he wants us to take away. Is the stoking of the divisive nightmare that was Covid necessary? Maybe it’s too soon, or perhaps “Eddington” will be a way for generations to look back at America in an identity crisis. As of now, we’re still in the middle of that struggle.
For What it's Worth 
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