Fingernails is a film about pulling people’s fingernails off and the definition of love, and that sounds like a fake plot. The movie exists in the singular reductive phrase of “this is like a Black Mirror episode” group of films. It unfortunately slots itself in there pretty well, with a new technology being introduced that changes the way we work as a society, in true Black Mirror fashion.
We start off with Anna (Jessie Buckley) looking for a career change. She is looking to work in the Love Institute. A retro-futuristic idea of a place where couples can go to get definitive answers on their love for each other, all for the price of viscerally ripping one fingernail off from each partner and placing them in a glorified microwave to beep and boop about, until displaying a CRT message showing a percentage of their love, ranging from 0 to 100%.
There is a little bit of a relation to vaccination hestatan in the beginning, with people hesitant to take the test with their partner. Other people seem as though they are holding back judgement for those who decide not to take the test, similar to the reaction of someone who decided not to take the vaccine. OBVIOUSLY this is a different situation of global health instead of singular and fictional love tests, but there seemed like a similarity in their conversations from couple to couple. I thought this may have been explored deeper, but we get one Love test denier and then swiftly move on.
Along with this test, the Love Institute runs exercises and courses ahead of taking the test to ensure people are going to get the desired outcome or work on upping their percentage from a previous test.
While working on these workshops, Anna shadows Amir (Riz Ahmed), who is experienced in his field. They build a relationship, while building others relationships.
Not a unique sentiment, but I feel like the idea of this film is better than its execution. It does a good job with the setup of the story, and the general vibe of the world. I think it falls short in the more in depth looks on marriage and love as a fluid concept, being so rigidly stuffed into science. The test is touted as being definitive, but seems to go against itself in moments where there doesn’t seem to be love there. I understand that this is sort of the point of the story, but it doesn’t push this far enough to feel impactful in the conflicting emotions that Anna is having.
I think if this test was a real thing, a lot of people would actually go for it, looking for answers for questions they ask themselves everyday, hoping to affirm their feelings. This makes it an interesting concept for a film, one that is not in our world, but disturbingly believable. It changes the fundamental understanding of something that we’re not really expected to understand, love as a theory comes in so many forms and is rarely unconditional. This test though, boils it down to yes or no. I would have loved for this film to explore this a lot more, especially in the context of Anna, who is seeking ways to affirm her 100% result with her husband Ryan (Jeremy Allen White), who she is having doubts about when she joins the Love Institute. There is a level of guilt that Anna has, in that she is unsure of her feelings but got a positive result in the test, where many couples fail at achieving. She feels she needs to cling onto the love she has because she would be a fool to let go of her one true love when people fight for (or lose) theirs just to get a positive result.
The fighting I had to do was a really embarrassing obsession with the dead pixels left in the film. I assume this was a creative choice, giving the film more of an authentic film look, but with the warm low contrast look of the film, they stood out prominently for me, especially with the lack of other film related imperfections. I understand this could just be an issue with me and my stupid eyes but it did take me out of the film at times.
Other than that nonsense complaint, the camera work was really lovely in this film. Lovely feels like I’m talking down to it, but I mean it in an actual good way, in a way that I find it hard to think of another word. It was close, warm and cohesive from scene to scene.
The Love Institute is eerily clinical in its set decoration, to reflect the basic definition of love that they have projected onto the emotion. It was dressed and shot like a bland office, offering bland and boring services.
The film is one that I had a lot of expectations for, based on cast and premise alone. While I think most of the cast did a fine job, I didn’t really feel a huge amount of chemistry between Anna and Amir until much later into the film. I also felt a lack of empathy towards Ryan in the moments where I felt like I should be feeling it, just watching the purposefully stilted conversations, not really engaging in their deeper emotional depths. As any sane human, I am a Jeremy Allen White superfan, but I didn’t feel it in this and I hate myself for it.
Fingernails is an example of an idea that feels exciting to do, but feels like a dive into the idea without much consideration for the bigger picture of why the idea is good or what the story around that idea should be. I’m sure people will get complete satisfaction from this, like a forgettable Black Mirror episode, but it is slotting itself right into the middle of my 2023 list, only to be remembered when I scroll through.
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