‘Disclaimer’ Review: Alfonso Cuaron’s Vicious Apple Series Is an Astute, All-Consuming Thriller
Near the start of Alfonso Cuarón’s sharply spiked Apple series, “Disclaimer,” a presenter at an awards ceremony honoring documentarian Catherine Ravenscroft (Cate Blanchett) begins her speech by giving notice: “Beware of narrative and form,” she says. “Their power can bring us closer to the truth, but they can also be a weapon with a great power to manipulate.” Stories, like the ones Catherine crafts for her living, can provide clarity, but they can also be tailored by the teller to suit their own aims. They can take advantage of our assumptions and ingrained biases to steer us not toward the truth, but toward a desired distortion of that truth.
“In this way, Catherine’s work reveals something more problematic and profound: our own complicity in some of today’s more toxic social sins.”
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Complicity. Narrative. Form. Cuarón isn’t shy in laying out his thesis, instructing the audience to watch carefully as his seven-episode adaptation of Renée Knight’s 2015 novel plays out. What information do we know, and what information do we only presume to know? Who’s providing it? How are they providing it? These questions are always top of mind, but the four-time Academy Award winner behind “Roma,” “Gravity,” and “Children of Men” trusts in his story — and his team’s storytelling prowess — to sweep you up anyway. Which it does, and they do. “Disclaimer” is a cunning psychological thriller with twists and turns enough to thrive as pure entertainment. But never does it drift from its initial portent, so that when the truth comes crashing down, it levels everyone involved, onscreen and off.
“Disclaimer” unfurls across three points of view. One belongs to Stephen Brigstocke, played by Kevin Kline, a long-time teacher at a private school who finally gives up on, well, everything. His wife, Nancy, died nine years ago. Before that, they lost their only son, Jonathan. Perhaps being surrounded by so many living reminders of the child he lost is why Stephen’s devotion to his pupils has curdled into apathy. Where once he saw eager, hopeful students, now there are only “spoiled, entitled brats.” So, when a parent voices what seems like a routine complaint about a bad grade, Stephen chooses forced retirement over a simple apology. He’s tired. He’s done. Like chalk wiped from a chalkboard, Mr. Brigstocke is prepared to simply disappear.
That is, until he starts going through his wife’s old things. It turns out Nancy (played in flashbacks by Lesley Manville) wrote a book before she died, and she based that book on their son’s fateful trip to Venice. When Stephen reads it, he’s infuriated — so infuriated, he wakes up. Like a geriatric John Wick, he’s back from the dead for one final job, and one character in particular faces the bulk of his ire. “I knew that woman,” Stephen says via voiceover. “I’d known her name for years. But until [I read Nancy’s novel], I thought she was just an innocent bystander in my life’s demise.”
Enter Catherine Ravenscroft. If we first saw Stephen laying down on the train tracks of life, waiting to be run over, then we meet Catherine in executive class, sipping champagne. She and her husband Robert (Sacha Baron Cohen) just moved into a stunning new house in London. Everywhere she goes, someone congratulates her on the award. Back at the office, she has her pick of which project to tackle next, since Hollywood studios are bidding to adapt her work into a feature film (or so she tells a jealous colleague, who’s easily convinced by Catherine’s little white lie).
Yes, Catherine is living the high life, until one evening, she gets a random book in the mail. The author’s name is unfamiliar, but the story within hits close to home. Before she can finish reading, Catherine runs to the bathroom to throw up. Once completed, she tries to burn the book in her kitchen sink. “I think I’m being punished,” she tells Robert, when he comes rushing down to turn off the smoke alarm. Though too afraid to get into details, Catherine says the novel doesn’t name her directly, but its description of her is undeniable. And just inside the cover, a disclaimer reads, “Any resemblance to persons living or dead is not a coincidence.”
Soon, it’s clear what Catherine read is Nancy’s story, which also serves as the series’ third point-of-view. Scenes of a young man and his girlfriend fornicating on trains, under bridges, and in gondolas (or so the randy boyfriend briefly hoped) interrupt Catherine and Stephen’s arcs, teasing the untoward backstory one character is trying to keep a lid on and the other is trying to turn loose. How Jonathan (Louis Partridge) and Catherine’s lives intertwine is best left to Cuarón & Co., but the balancing act between these three narratives is one of many masterful touches that keeps tension as taut as the spine of an unopened book.
As will undoubtedly make waves in Venice, once the discourse descends on a series that eagerly invites discussion, “Disclaimer” is filled with lustful flirtation, upsetting violence, and graphic sex scenes. It’s not for the easily offended, and multiple episodes come with their own specific trigger warnings. But the sex scenes also serve as a direct rebuttal to recent, puritanical complaints about purposeless onscreen affairs. Each telling look, each domineering direction, each cry, gasp, and moan informs the viewer of something vital; something that’s unmistakable in the moment but that’s greater purpose doesn’t become entirely clear until “Disclaimer” has revealed its full truth; something where the scenes’ irrepressible titillation becomes its own twisted, unmistakable point.
Cuarón, who writes and directs every episode (or “chapter,” as he apparently prefers to call them), seems primarily driven to interrogate the hasty construction of modern public opinion, often shaped by carelessly assembled headlines, social media posts, or other shortcuts to understanding today’s events, tomorrow’s challenges, and the people behind them both. The way “Disclaimer” preys on our own bloodthirsty nature to dole out judgment could seem like a screed against cancel culture, if it wasn’t so well-positioned to appreciate accountability. So many characters who’ve read Nancy’s book are quick to say some version of, “I’m glad that bitch got what’s coming to her.” But for as vicious as the series can get, it’s careful, even considerate, in doling out comeuppance.
It’s also unsurprisingly striking. With Emmanuel Lubezki and Bruno Delbonnel serving as his two cinematographers, Cuarón relies on a number of long takes to bottle up the frenzied immediacy of conversations fueled by fear. Catherine tries to explain herself to her husband as they circle their exquisite island countertop, her panicked comments colliding with his calm reassurances. (Blanchett, in a role that’s a sneaky-great follow-up to Lydia Tár, excels at cutting through the chaos with vital precision.) “You can tell me anything,” Robert says, “and I swear I will never, ever judge you.” Well, Robert hasn’t heard “anything” just yet, and once he does, the camera mimics his restlessness in a way that makes it our own. He has to know more. He has to know now. And he’s not the only one.
Amid all the hubbub, viewers would be wise to heed Cuarón’s initial warning: How “Disclaimer” tells its story is critical to appreciating (and preparing for) its conclusions. Pay attention to the tenses chosen for each voiceover, as well as the visual framing devices utilized for each perspective. Some formal choices guide you toward the truth, while other cues are deliberate red herrings, hooking you on a line that leads right back to your own rod. In the end, I expect more than a few bitter reactions to Cuarón’s most provocative project since “Y tu mamá también.” But no one can argue they went in unprepared.
Grade: A-
“Disclaimer” premiered Friday, August 30 at the 2024 Venice Film Festival. Apple TV+ will release the first two episodes Friday, October 11, with new episodes each week through the finale on November 15.
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