Animus: On the Natural Place of Misanthropy in An Era of Destructive Nihilism

Jamie Murray’s Animus, is a dystopian thriller set against a backdrop of ecological disaster. Premised on dialogue between a cannibal subject and his state issued psychologist, what they really discuss are the contours of morality.  

Subject A-652 (Fenn Leon, mixing apathy with a subtle childlike vulnerability), a sociopath who surrendered himself after cannibalising an elderly man (Matthew Murray), has the air about him of every screen sociopath: bored with and contemptuous of society, curious about his interlocutor—and views both as prey. His chief subject of interest is the non-human being. In a time of intensified mass extinctions, they are particularly interesting to him, akin to treasure or a hidden city. He quotes his father (He who makes a beast of himself is freed from the pain of being a man) as context for what he has done. Out of a blinkered view of animals he has built himself a guidebook for nihilism flavoured brutality. 

Across from A-652, Psych 2B (a tempered Chis Hardy) has exactly 15 minutes to evaluate A-652. Psych 2B pokes and prods his assertions, forays beneath the surface for the whole picture, and in the process gives the film its dialectical bent. Can birds be called cruel if they are following their nature? Is there an alternative to being cruel if cruelty is elemental to survival? And how may we weigh social orders and moral orders against each other? 

The imagery divides itself between the blue-green calibrated stillness of the present, archival footage, and AI generated depictions of A-652’s flawed ideas of the world. The latter aspect creates irony as his talk of basic instinct and savagery is represented using technology that is just as merciless yet reaches not deep towards the crude base of all living beings but altogether outside of it. 

The film successfully maintains an oppressive air throughout, even in the cavernous hall of the evaluation. It retains A-652’s essential coldness despite a supporting cast. Having erroneously translated misanthropy into a pure fascination with animals, and identifying with them, A-652 himself becomes the subject of study. His mannerisms, diction, and gaze are all objects of scrutiny. The editing gives them deliberate attention and more than once it unveils something of anguish, as though he has not yet mapped the entire depths of himself. 

Animus takes their antipathy and spreads it across the narrative in a shroud of airlessness that defeats any attempt at catharsis. In relative terms, though the uneasy connection between the two characters affects one more than the other, to each the degree is significant. Whether it answers the state’s question is another matter, and nearly irrelevant.