Mystifying drama saved by a brilliant lead performance

Under the Silver Lake 15 cert, 139 min ★★★★★ Dir David Robert Mitchell

Starring Andrew Garfield, Riley Keough, Topher Grace, Zosia Mamet, Jimmi Simpson, Patrick Fischler, Luke Baines, Callie Hernandez, Riki Lindhome, Don Mcmanus

In 2014, David Robert Mitchell had a remarkable cult hit with It Follows. Now he’s back with a risky, sprawling Marmite movie in the shape of Under the Silver Lake.

And what a peculiar experience it is, like rummaging in a ball pit of abstruse LA lore, movie idolatry and dissociative psychodrama. Its woozy, cracked vision will alienate some, mystify more and entrance a select few. Far from cashing in on the clever genre footwork of It Follows, Mitchell has gone for broke, and the film’s wandering quality feels beholden to nobody: it takes us on a quest for a quest’s sake, dangling no promise of a certain outcome.

Nothing would work if Andrew Garfield weren’t flat-out tremendous, in a lead role that requires him to shamble his way around the Silver Lake neighbourhood, searching for clues to an occult conspiracy that may or may not exist. He’s Sam, an unemployed stoner hobbyist and binocular-wielding peeping Tom, who lives in one of those curling, tiered apartment complexes around a swimming pool.

A plot of sorts materialises when his new neighbour Sarah (Riley Keough) abruptly disappears, just after he’s spent an evening with her. What he does to find her – the definition of a private investigation, with no one even paying – is pretty messed up.

Suffice it to say, there’s an awful lot to parse on a single viewing. Sections of the audience will lose patience with it at points – some irretrievably. Sam, for his part, disappears down a rabbit hole, crawls back out, and wonders if he’s lost his mind down there.

If this is Mitchell trying to go the full David Lynch, he’s not holding back. I haven’t mentioned the murderous owl woman on the prowl, or the trios of promised concubines in a chamber where black-and-white films play all day. It all adds up to an 8-bit maze, in a sad boy’s head, with no discernible exit.