Really didn't get it

My understanding of the film (and subsequent very very brief research into the book) is that it's a commentary on social standing and class divides. In some ways it is about 'Keeping up with the Joneses' but it's so much more than that. It's more about WHY people feel the need to 'keep up'.

I think on a base level it's not a start-middle-end film, but more a film that shows how sometimes relatively arbitrary things like floor levels (socio-economic classes) and parties (social standing) affect people's mindsets so much that it becomes a war underneath the surface.

I think it's a bit of a riff on the emotions that bubble underneath the polite chatter in real life relating to social advancement (the judgement, comparisons, etc) but they've basically turned the volume up to 11 and had it break out into murder & debauchery.

I thought the film was messy in parts but I'm a fan of Ben Wheatley and even though I'd have maybe liked a more structured plot element (it kind of just...ended which can at times leave you feeling unfulfilled) I really enjoyed it. It was a fun yet dark ride.

I didn't get it either. I downloaded the book from a free trial offer from Audible this morning and have listened to three chapters so far. Narrated by Tom Hiddleston, it has all become clear. The film serves as an excellent visual to an interesting novel. I also perused a brief biography of the author, and plan to read many more of his works, and will watch the two other films made from his books. He endured an extreme situation during the war in his youth, and perhaps that is what enables J. G. Ballard to understand and write about the darkness of the human psyche, which the high rise sets free in this film. The point isn't about why residents didn't walk away. Instead Ballard explores the forces that mesmerise the residents. If we could watch war nightly as we watched the Vietnamese war in the 60s, it could possibly surplant reality television programs altogether. Perhaps that is the reason journalists were largely banned from subsequent wars especially in the middle east. It also explores the fascination we have with disasters, and even the stupid national quibbling that spills into these boards. When you see an inordinate number of responses to a comment, you can be sure someone has insulted one nationality or another. And we read them, and jump into the fray. Like the high rise residents in the film. Get real people, if I were to judge all Canadians by my two best Canadian friends, I would believe all Canadian women were abused wimps, as one chose to stay with a physical alcoholic abuser for over 20 years until he stripped her of every asset, then dumped her, and the other chose to stay for 16 years with a rampant womanizer who sired a child born within weeks of his own child, in a tiny northern village, where every person knew exactly what was going on except my friend, until his arrest for illegal activity. One mutual acquaintance described her as a "willing victim." And since her rougue husband was northern european, that lets us off the hook on this continent. Only the old world could produce such an abberant person, it must not be safe to be a tourist in Europe at all anymore, especially since they have admitted all those migrants. See? It is so easy to fall into that kind of thinking, as it springs from the innate biological urges we are all born with. It is amazingly stupid to focus on the behavior of individuals in countries with millions and millions of people. And that is the exact point of High Rise. Under certain circumstances whether of class, nationality, economic status, political power, "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas." High rise and condominium living concentrates people to the point where moral boundaries disintegrate. My 94 year old aunt lives in one of these convenient communities, which have become the norm for her age grouo, unlike the time when the novel was written. She said once, "They do it like rabbits around here."

Kudos to J.G. Ballard for his close observation of various personalities, prescient imagination, and enduring works. Kudos to the film makers for their attempt to visualize this novel. It does expose the gap between the written word and the film. I would even go so far as to suggest a narrated version, to bridge the two and make the film comprehensible upon the initial viewing. A similar thing happened with LeCarre's The Night Manager, which led me to this film. It was so chopped up it was impossible to understand what was going on in an initial, single viewing. When I watched it again, it did hang together, the pieces were all there. One realizes at the moment of the tryst, the Spanish lawyer was actually being murdered, a truly dangerous liaison indeed. For High Rise, one should probably read the book first. Should I mention Tom Hiddleston and his mesmerizing performances? The icing on the cake? Or is he the whole cake. Nah, 'nuf said.