‘Rumours’: Cate Blanchett Channels Angela Merkel in Her Weirdest Movie Yet

Within the first 15 minutes of Rumours, the newest off-kilter fantasia from Canadian director Guy Maddin and his collaborators Evan and Galen Johnson, the ensemble of main characters stumble upon a dead body. A bog body, specifically—a preserved human from the Iron Age whose flesh has been mummified by the underground peat while the passing millennia melted their bones away.

Bog bodies are often the remains of tribal leaders, the local archaeologist explains, killed by their subordinates in ritual sacrifice when their leadership proved unsatisfactory. It’s a groaningly obvious dig at the movie’s themes: Rumours takes place at a near-future version of the G7 summit, and its cast are seven of the world’s most powerful heads of state, gathered together to solve an unnamed crisis—or die trying.

The film, which hits theaters in the U.S. Oct. 18, is led by an international cast, each playing fictional presidents and prime ministers of the seven nations of the G7. As Charles de Gaulle once decreed that the leader of a country ought to embody l’esprit de la nation, the characters in Rumours exhibit stereotypes particular to their home country, each more absurd than the last.

Cate Blanchett, as German Chancellor Hilda Ortmann (an Angela Merkel analog), wears a salmon suit jacket and a bob, speaking in a clipped accent about the most efficient ways of steering this meeting. “Just a short walk,” she says, describing the trek from the photo-call at the summit’s grand estate to a lakeside gazebo where they’ll take their dinner. American President Edison Wolcott (Charles Dance) emanates old-money FDR elegance with a touch of Yankee bravado. Prime Minister of Canada and ladykiller Maxime Laplace (Roy Dupuis), in a salt-and-pepper ponytail, is plagued by ennui after a tortured love affair. Italian Prime Minister Antonio Lamorte (Rolando Ravello) runs around with slices of salami in his pocket.

They are all gathered for the annual summit to draft a “provisional statement” regarding some unnamed crisis currently impacting the world. It’s unclear whether this is a war or an environmental catastrophe or something more, but everyone at the summit seems more than a little overwhelmed, and their plans to draft a statement go awry as quickly as a high-school group project with too many members. As the sun goes down and people start disappearing into the surrounding woods, claiming sightings of beasts or zombies (or worse, protesters), the summit descends into phantasmagorical chaos that threatens to upend the entire world.

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If that sounds more like a comedy than a horror movie, that’s because it is. Maddin and the Johnsons infuse Rumours with his sly, absurdist sense of humor, crafting scenes that start one way before quickly turning to outrageous spectacle. After a certain point, you’re unsure if what you’re seeing is reality or fantasy. Its political commentary, such as it is, is much like Swedish director Ruben Östlund’s social satires (à la Triangle of Sadness), but goofier, more surreal, and more unconstrained. The American president arrives equipped with a stars-and-stripes napkin. The summit’s theme is “regret.” A giant psychic brain crouches in the middle of the woods, preaching apocalypse.

From a purely visual perspective, Rumours is stunning. The trio of filmmakers continue to push the boundaries of movie visuals in a way that feels both forward-thinking and classic. There are shots of the characters walking through the endless woods that almost look like scenes from a 1970s slasher movie Nighttime. Environments are lit by intense shades of bright purples, aggressive reds, and sickly greens. Fog machines abound, staining the outer edges of every frame to a degree not seen since the heyday of Hammer Horror. It feels almost strange for such a farcical movie to have the kind of scenery that wouldn’t be out of place in John Boorman’s Excalibur (minus the giant brain).

Rumours is a political satire with a lo-fi, practical touch, a horror comedy that doesn’t skimp on the goofy or the gruesome. While it mainly sticks to low-hanging fruit when it comes to the political-commentary angle, the spooky surrealism takes it to new, unexpected places. The flatness of the characters make the film’s fantastical elements all the more vibrant. And there are worse ways to spend your time than watching Cate Blanchett do a German accent for two hours.

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