SXSW Review: ‘The Carnivores’ Uncovers the Strain in a Relationship
“I feel like we need to bury something . . . seems like a waste of a hole.”
In Caleb Michael Johnson’s film The Carnivores, an underlying issue pervades Bret (Lindsay Burdge) and Alice’s (Tallie Medel) relationship. Bret is acting distant, Alice is trying to get closer, and between them is Bret’s sick dog, Harvey. Putting a toll on their finances and their relationship, Alice struggles to find her place with her significant other when the well being of the dog is prioritized above all else. Bret obsesses over the dog constantly, and Alice finds herself emotionally neglected, manifesting her psychological troubles by sleepwalking and breaking with her vegetarian diet via cravings for meat.
During one of those comatose sleepwalks, Alice wakes up in a ditch with a dog’s ear next to her. Given her distain for Harvey and her recent impulses, she believes she has killed, and possibly eaten her girlfriend’s pet. The ensuing events see Bret desperately trying to find her dog while Alice works to recover the relationship and hide what she has done.
The Carnivores works heavily in metaphor. Oblique and opaque at times, Johnson intermingles notions of lustful cravings, finding peace with letting go, and fixing a damaged relationship with the events of a missing dog and a relapse into carnivorous tendencies. In a statement from the director, Johnson said, “I've long been interested in the ways in which people in a relationship conceal and consume themselves and each other for better and worse, intentionally or accidentally.” While I don’t know how well it all congeals thematically, especially near the climax, the film’s resolve assures healing after an arduous strain in a relationship.
Harvey is a barrier in front of both Alice and Bret, and when that barrier is removed, both have room to reconnect. For Alice, meat eating perhaps takes on her lustful sentiment for Bret. Having been neglected emotionally and physically for so long, she starts to wonder if this relationship will go anywhere, even going in so far as to keep a dated journal for her interactions with Bret. Alice puts her best foot forward with no success, resulting in a newfound desire for consuming other bodily flesh, a metaphorical allusion for sexual desires and an implication that dating someone else might be in her future.
Bret comes to a realization that her behavior has gone too far. An obsession with her dog has proven too damaging to her relationship. Her narrow sightedness, sporadic behavior, and impulsive accusations leads her down a road of loneliness and isolation. Her search makes her realize that her dog will pass, but long after that pet there will be Alice.
These two arcs oscillate on different wavelengths, going in different directions for each character until they eventually come together by circumstance at the end. As noted, it’s very metaphorical, even delving into dreamlike surrealism where you question the reality of the narrative. While you may think you have your finger on the film’s pulse in one moment, the following sequence has you reevaluating the director’s intentions. Reading between the lines and analyzing how Alice and Bret’s characters compliment one another is perplexing, but it results in some of the film’s more ambitious and creative moments.
When you reach the end, both Alice and Bret have confronted a hurdle in their relationship separately. In the middle of the film, Alice digs a hole for Harvey’s ear, a symbolic burial for a dog not yet found. She says, “I feel like we need to bury something . . . seems like a waste of a hole.” Neither her nor Bret have realized it at the time, but what will fill that hole is the metaphorical strain in their relationship. They’ll confront it, and soon it’ll be buried.
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