Swallow is a movie about a woman with pica, the affliction that makes some people want to eat the inedible – stuff like wax, dirt, cotton, and all sorts of other things with no nutritional value. Think TLC’s My Strange Addiction. The root cause of pica is still up for debate, but it’s been known to show up in certain cultures (making the argument for it being a learned behavior, or tradition, rather than a psychological issue). It’s also prevalent in pregnant women.
In Swallow, Haley Bennett plays a very run-of-the-mill “I used to work retail” type who lucks into a relationship with a successful and wealthy guy who comes from a successful and wealthy family. From the get go, it’s clear that these two are at odds with each other: she feels wildly inadequate around him and his family, resulting in her being a mousy pushover, and he seems only interested in her feelings on a superficial level.
She’s bored, anxious, and desperate to make him happy. He’s focused on work, money, and making sure his tie matches his outfit. How these two got together in the first place (they met at her place of work, but like, how?) or why they’re still together is anyone’s guess. Yet they continue to try and make things work. She has dinner ready for him when he gets home from the office and talks about the type of curtains she wants for the living room; he, half-interested, smiles politely and later gives her noogies in bed to show that he’s not all that bad.
Very soon, she gets pregnant, and everyone seems pleased by this development. Soon after that, though, the eating of weird things begins. At this point, Swallow is likely to confuse its audience, however unintentionally so. It shapes a certain narrative, one that makes us believe she’s eating these harmful things as a way to regain control of her life, to exert the power she seems to have lost/never had. In reality, however, it’s likely just a side effect of her pregnancy. The characters in the film don’t realize this (everyone acts like she’s crazy), and we the audience don’t realize this either. (Unless, of course, we’d done some heavy Wikipedia’ing beforehand. I didn’t; I did mine afterward.)
That’s pretty much the first two-thirds of the movie. If none of this sounds particularly scary or spooky or thrilling, it’s because it’s not. Swallow is not a horror movie, nor is it a psychological thriller. Hell, it’s not even Hysteria-sploitation along the lines of Repulsion. I wouldn’t even consider it horrific, in the way some nuclear warfare movies are horrific. Swallow is just a straight forward drama about a woman dealing with some unprocessed, repressed trauma from her childhood.
Oh right: the trauma.
Without giving too much away, the third act takes a sharp left turn, and dives even deeper into the dramatic aspects of story.
Haley Bennett does an incredible job here – this is entirely her movie, and she’s the primary reason to watch. The rich family are pretty one-dimensional. In terms of contemporary cinema, I’d say Get Out (yes, a horror movie) did a better job of portraying wealthy people as despicable and dangerous while also depicting them harmless and disarming.
Overall, I’m a little stumped at how to feel about the movie, mainly because of how poorly its been marketed. It seems wrong to play it off as some psycho-drama and cash in on that A24 brand of classy spooks. It cheapens what the movie actually has to offer, which is a look at someone with a strange affliction, and how those around them process it.
Reminds me of the time I went to see Cold Creek Manor. I’ll never forget how disappointed I was, all because of how badly it was marketed. Look up the trailer. Watch it. Tell me that doesn’t look like a haunted house movie. Well, it’s not! It’s not a horror movie at all.
Neither is Swallow.
Doc is a horror journalist and maker of scary wares at Camera Viscera.