From Cannes: Unsettling ‘Club Zero’ Loses Its Way

Set in a high-intensity private school, “Club Zero” is a disturbing tale of how neglectful parents and vulnerable children make a dangerous combination. Ms. Novak (Mia Wasikowska), an eccentric nutrition expert, arrives to teach a class on “Conscious Eating,” but her beliefs and her lessons quickly become shockingly extreme.

Perhaps best classified as a moody horror film, “Club Zero” is far from a slow burn. By the second lesson, Ms. Novak’s teachings have already become completely unhinged. Her calm yet impassioned delivery of information printed on analog presentation cards validates her otherwise preposterous suggestions that the students eat as little as possible until eventually, nothing at all.

The children Ms. Novak works with are deftly introduced through complex sequences in the very first scene, and her manipulation of their insecurities, fears, and hopes is chilling to see unfold as the children engage in increasingly disordered habits. They alternatively bully and encourage each other to keep up the diet in order to impress Ms. Novak. The effect is emphasized by the numerous smooth panning shots moving through barren classrooms and bustling lunch rooms as Ms. Novak’s ideology creeps further in.

Despite its mundane school setting, “Club Zero” manages to be visually appealing. The flared shorts and knee high socks on the uniforms create an unusual silhouette, and the muted, airy classrooms contrast well with the students’ colorfully saturated bedrooms at home. Similarly, the lack of technology in the film is refreshing — Ms. Novak’s vintage lessons and the focus on food helps ground the narrative in the horrifying indoctrination and the children’s inner struggles instead of making it about how they are perceived in social media.

Of the seven children in Ms. Novak’s class, the film centers on four of them, exploring their contentious relationships with their parents and the reasons why they are especially vulnerable to Ms. Novak’s teaching. Though it’s a little strange how the other children are ignored when Ms. Novak’s classes are highly personal, the smaller focus does allow for more depth of characters. Fred (Luke Barker) is an aspiring dancer with neglectful parents who — despite no preexisting eating disorders — quickly becomes worryingly close to Ms. Novak. On the other hand, Elsa (Ksenia Devriendt) enters the program already bulimic, copying her mother’s habits, while Ragna (Florence Baker) just wants to overcome her parents' judgment and become a better trampolinist In contrast to his affluent peers, Ben (Samuel D Anderson) is competing for a full scholarship, as his father passed away and his mother struggles to afford the tuition.

Initially, the students buy into “Conscious Eating” to various degrees, with tensions rising among the group due to this imbalance. Ultimately, their shared desire to have someone to rely on, given how much the adults in their lives let them down, makes Ms. Novak’s ideas dangerously seductive. Though only lightly explored, the crushes between Fred and Ragna, and Elsa and Ben, and related moments of animosity among them, are excellent examples of teen drama being used to elevate this plot that uses disordered eating as an avenue to these neglected students. The children are all touted as extremely gifted, but when their talents are showcased, what appears on screen does not line up with this characterization (in particular with Ragna’s trampolining being at the complete beginner level) — and it remains unclear whether this was intentional. Perhaps an attempt to show how unrealistic their parents' expectations are, it introduces some unneeded confusion about a minor aspect.

Unfortunately, “Club Zero” loses focus in the second half. Once the students have embarked on their goal to survive without eating, the narrative seems to run out of momentum, floundering in circles without answering any questions. Wasikowska’s acting is chilling as the sinister teacher, but her character is unbearably vague as her motivations go unexplored. Despite some isolated instances of unexplained pseudo-religious fanaticism, it is never elaborated how sincere Ms. Novak is in her beliefs. Though Ms. Novak seems a true believer, she only discusses her beliefs about eating with people she is trying to convince, and the narrative gives no more interrogation to the titular concept of surviving without eating beyond the children themselves.

Several bizarre plot threads are also introduced but not taken to any meaningful conclusion, resulting in a film that plays a game of whack-a-mole that introduces as many tropes as possible. The inclusion of some of the parents’ shallow concerns about school politics in a story that comes about because of the parents’ inability to be there for their own children is deliciously ironic, but they make such consistently terrible parenting choices that it is hard to be sympathetic.

Though it starts strong, the film unsatisfyingly peters off. It is clear “Club Zero” does not intend to be a cautionary tale, instead reveling in the horror completely, but it seems unable to decide what it does want to achieve.

—Staff writer Millie Mae Healy can be reached at milliemae.healy@thecrimson.com.