In the latest from filmmaker Gore Verbinski, director of The Ring and Pirates of the Caribbean, comes a tale of a man who is not well. Lockhart, a wealthy young stockbroker on Wall Street, has been conditioned to believe that he is happy because he has money. However, when his company calls on him to visit a secluded Alpine medical spa, retrieve CEO Pembroke, and bring him back to New York to take care of business matters, Lockhart finds that he, too, might be in need of some medical assistance. It’s not long before Lockhart becomes a patient himself, hoping to be cured, but as he’ll soon find out, no one here ever gets better, and no one ever leaves.
I was lucky enough to sit down and chat with stars Dane DeHaan, Mia Goth, and director Gore Verbinski to discuss their new film A Cure For Wellness on behalf of Bloody Disgusting. In the interview, we discuss the mystery of the sanitarium, the relentless ambition that makes us all sick, and the psychological experiment that will be performed on all audience members who choose to see this movie in theaters.
“I think deep down he knows he’s not well” says Dane DeHaan of his character Lockhart. “I think he’s a person that thinks he’s in control of his life, but there’s this underlying part of him that he knows he’s not. I think he’s a person that thinks he’s on top of things, and really like winning at life, but really, he has the sickness.”
In the movie, restless busy body Lockhart travels thousands of miles to acquire his business partner, and return him back to the normal part of the world, a.k.a. Wall Street. Despite his intention to quickly grab Pembroke and head out on the fastest flight home, once he’s standing on the wellness center grounds, and under the watchful eye of Director Volmer, Lockhart discovers a sickness growing within him, and reluctantly accepts treatment in order to rid the harmful toxins of the fast paced money grabbing world out of his system, in the hopes that he will one day be well again.
But what is the sickness? Everyone here is searching for the cure, but what exactly is it that they are trying to heal? According to director Gore Verbinski, the sickness is blind ambition.
“It’s sort of diagnosing modern man, if you will, and I think to the people who are particularly vulnerable are the people who have done whatever it takes to sort of succeed or to get ahead” explains Verbinski of his characters’ willingness to accept treatment. “So this place is sort of preying upon oligarchs, and head of industry, and in this case, Lockhart, who is going to do anything to succeed, but I mean, that’s not really wellness, is it? Money and success, particularly in the case of Lockhart, who, he doesn’t make pottery or shoes or guitars, he makes money, he makes money off of people who make something, so the idea was to try to hand pick the people who come to this place because Director Volmer is sort of offering absolution in a way. He’s saying ‘You’re not responsible because you’re not well’ and that sort of note from Doctor I think in the initial phase, that’s what keeps them there, that’s the sort of narcotic if you will”.
Dane DeHaan says his character Lockhart is the perfect patient for this institute, because chasing money all of his life has left him with little humanity to speak of.
“For Lockhart in the movie, why he’s such a great protagonist for the story is because he’s blindly in pursuit of money and power, and he’s willing to step on other people to get to the top. He’s consumed by that quest and he’s like a slave to his company and his corporation and that’s all he cares about, and he thinks that makes him a well man, but that is the sickness, and that’s why when he’s diagnosed, he gives into the treatment”.
While at the hospital, Lockhart befriends a shy girl named Hannah, who says that she’s been in the system since she was born. Lockhart is instantly drawn to Hannah, both for her sweet nature, and for her closeness in age, but he’ll soon find that his new friend has just as many secrets as the sanitarium that houses them.
“I felt that I was able to find a lot of parallels between my life and her life, and this leap from having to go from girlhood to womanhood was one of them” says Mia Goth of her sheltered character Hannah. “It’s quite a journey for her, and at times it’s thrilling, at times it’s terrifying, at times it’s exciting and sometimes painful, and that’s something that I really connected with, and I think that’s quite a universal thing for women all over the world”.
Together, Hannah and Lockhart search for answers to the many questions that they hold about the seemingly tranquil sanitarium. What is the cure? How does one achieve wellness? What’s Director Volmer’s end goal? What’s the real story behind the history of this hillside hospital? Only time will tell, but one scenario that moviegoers may not have thought to consider is that as we are watching Lockhart and Hannah being toyed with, we, too, are being experimented on. At least, that’s what director Verbinski says about going to the movies.
“I think it’s one of those genres where you can kind of bend to a dream logic, I mean I think when Dane’s character Lockhart makes his way to this place, he’s entering the place of dreams and nightmares and so I think that you know that type of narrative, you can prey upon the audience’s motivation to discover, and you can use enigma to tell that story” says director Verbinski in a manner that’s just as mysterious as his nursing staff in the film. “You’re watching Dane’s character reluctantly become a patient of this place, but really, you’re the patient, aren’t you? You’re in a darkened room and we’re using sound and image to kind of conduct a psychological experiment on the audience”.
Verbinski goes on to say that we, as an audience, are just as unwell as the character of Lockhart. We need the cure just as much as the patients of this dreamy asylum.
“I think there’s a reason why we’re gonna buy these pharmaceutical prescriptions even though the side effects are ridiculous, I mean whether you’re doing that, or whether you’re eating a kale wrap, or whatever, we must, at our core sense that something is not right with us or we wouldn’t be susceptible to that”.
A Cure For Wellness hits theaters everywhere on February 17th, 2017.
