Inside
A portrait of the artist as a trapped man
Willem Dafoe dives deep in this reflection on art culture and artists.
The job is simple: Art thief Nemo (Willem Dafoe) is supposed to grab three extremely expensive pieces of art from a penthouse and abscond. He’s got the codes for the alarm, a helicopter waiting to lift him from the crime scene, and a hacker who’s helping him in real-time.
An artist in his own right, Nemo scoffs at first at the apartment. It’s a cold space, with brutalist concrete floors and minimalist grey colors. It’s more of a gallery than a home, with wide open spaces for large displays and bleak white walls. There’s a sterile wading pond, a small patch of green space for decorative trees, and large saltwater fish tanks. It’s perfectly pretentious in every way.
But when the alarm malfunctions, Nemo realizes this gallery space is more foreboding than pompous. Steel doors trap him in the opulent apartment, his contact on the radio no longer responds to his frantic calls, and the alarm panel malfunction has started raising the temperature in the apartment. Now he’s sweltering in a literal gilded cage, eating scraps from the fridge and licking the interior of a smart freezer that plays the Macarena if left open too long.
It wouldn’t be a bad public art display, actually.
Desperate to survive and find a way out, Nemo begins to unravel. He watches the security feed on the TV desperate for human contact. He bounces from escape plan to escape plan, foiled by the security of the penthouse. But most importantly, he starts to look at the art on the walls and create his own. What is the point of art that’s locked away from human eyes? Can Nemo’s creativity set him free?
Movies with only one character on screen are a gamble. It’s hard enough to hold a scene, let alone an entire movie when you’ve got little to react to but yourself. Inside, much like J.C. Chandor’s All Is Lost, relies on a mostly silent performance from its star. Luckily director Vasilis Katsoupis selected Willem Dafoe for the task. Dafoe has one of the most singular faces on film and is capable of some stunning physical acting. We can see from the hunch of his shoulders and the set of his mouth how Nemo is feeling, though he rarely speaks. It’s an evocative performance and one that holds the screen beautifully.
Beyond a showcase for Dafoe’s formidable abilities, Katsoupis crafts Inside into a critique of art culture and collection. Every frame of film could be found in a modern art exhibit. Katsoupis is painstaking with his lighting and staging, letting the images speak for themselves. Though art is meant to be consumed, the pieces in this penthouse are as isolated as Nemo. What good is priceless art that’s locked away from view? Katsoupis and co-writer Ben Hopkins revel in Nemo’s contempt for his mark. Every piece is displayed so self-consciously, clearly meant to impress upon the viewer the owner’s sense of sophistication instead of the piece’s meaning.
But Katsoupis and Hopkins are interested in Nemo’s response to his predicament. He begins to create. He sketches the people he observes on the CCTV feed. He draws on the walls. Even the pile of furniture Nemo erects in hopes of escaping through a skylight has a stark architectural beauty to it. One wonders, when the penthouse owner returns, if he’ll frame Nemo’s destruction as a modern art display and sell it to MOMA.
A meditation on art, creative drive, and humanity, Inside might not be for everyone. But for those that appreciate reflective cinema and fine acting, this is a film to admire.
Verdict: Willem Dafoe is captivating in this one-man show.
Inside is rated R and is available to rent on your favorite VOD service.
