Clayface

4 outta 5

Clayface is the newest entry in the still sorta new DCU comic movie cinematic universe. He is a Batman villain without any Batman in this movie. Instead, this is a body horror film that delivers very great and very gross makeup and visual effects. It sort of has a standard horror movie structure of “wait around then the monster kills someone,” but it works well. Also the lead performance makes the main character both sympathetic and a crazy psycho. Power corrupts absolutely and is also really gooey.

Matt Hagen (Tom Rhys Harries) is a superstar actor. But when he sleeps with the beautiful Mia (Joana Ribeiro) it turns out she is the girlfriend of the brutal mob boss, Markos (David Denick). He is the jealous type so he takes out a switchblade and disfigures the actor. Matt’s world begins to unravel as he is branded a predator, loses all of his money to a crooked manager, Frank (Eddie Marsan), plastic surgery treatments go nowhere, and his buddy Cory (Joshua James) becomes famous. Desperate for help, Matt finds Dr. Caitlyn (Naomi Ackie) who is working on an experimental procedure that will regenerate tissue. He eventually convinces her to let him take the serum, and miraculously his face is healed. But it isn’t perfect and his face starts sagging like he’s made of clay and he morphs his body to take on the appearance of other folks. But his return to public life comes at a cost: his body continues to fall apart, and Caitlyn’s cop fiancé, John (Max Minghella), starts investigating Matt as people around him end up dead.

There is a distinct lack of Batman in what is technically a Batman film. It takes place in Gotham, there’s references to Coast City, and that’s about it. While people are thrown by someone having superpowers it doesn’t seem unbelievable, as this is set in the universe of Superman, Supergirl and Lanterns. There isn’t a reference to any of the other projects, although Clayface has already shown up briefly in the animated Creature Commandos. He was just a morphing goon there but this is an origin story. This is also a pretty self-contained body horror movie so connective tissue to any other DCU is kinda unnecessary, especially if Matt started yelling “Wow, I made an object with my mind like a Green Lantern!”

Harries as Hagen gets a wide variety of emotions. He starts off so cocky that he thinks he can bed the girlfriend of a mob boss without consequence, and then that mob boss takes away Matt’s money-maker:  his face. As his life falls apart he is downright sympathetic. Like any good villain origin story he starts as someone the audience can root for, until he begins murdering people. Marsan is fantastic at playing a complete douchebag so Matt murdering him gets a pass. Matt is also astounded at his powers, with such supernatural strength he can rip out the agent’s lying tongue. It’s pretty gross but a fair move for a horror flick.

When Matt’s face is restored he runs to the nearest red carpet to show off but his face starts to melt from the stress. He goes back to the doctor and pumps himself full of the drug and says, astounded “I actually feel great!” His morals continue to slide and eventually he ends up murdering his best friend (by hugging and smothering him in his clay chest). The scene when he confronts the mob boss and his goons is great as he pretends to be one of them and then it becomes a crazy action scene where he’s jumping around, killing, morphing and smiling the whole time. The way he takes out everybody at the end is very gross. The visual and makeup effects throughout are awesome, like when his eyes have glued shut on a flight experiencing turbulence and he has to cut it apart. The end of the movie has him briefly turn into the full Clayface monster and it looks close to the version from the 90s animated series.

As the doctor turned love interest, Ackie looks increasingly horrified at what her serum is doing to Matt. Her falling in love with him feels unbelievable as she is apparently very happy with her fiancé. Minghella as the cop / fiancé is likable as he’s trying to piece together why everyone around Matt keeps dying so her just ditching him for a gooey psychopath isn’t a smart move. Denick as the mob boss is believably sadistic, and Ribeiro as the girlfriend casually lets Matt get torn apart by her mobster boyfriend and they make for a good dysfunctional duo. As Matt’s buddy, James is a weeine, and when Matt bumps him off it suddenly becomes Godfather II with Matt saying “You broke my heart!” giving his buddy the gooey hug of death.

Matt is someone to feel sympathy for but eventually his greed and hate take over, transforming into a gooey revenge blob. If one wants intense and messy body horror, Clayface shows that the DCU is willing to go for extreme tonal extremes. Even if nobody in Gotham ever says the word “Batman” it is a unique and often disgusting entry to the DC Universe.