Well, where do we begin? As shameful as it is to say, I don’t think I’ve got the words that can appropriately describe Mandy, the latest film from the obscurely brilliant Panos Cosmatos. I wasn’t sure what I was getting myself into, but considering the director’s previous work, Beyond the Black Rainbow was a work of absolute genius, I was eager to look into his sophomore feature film, and despite the fact that Beyond the Black Rainbow was a bleak, terrifying and unnerving work of modern science fiction, I was not sure what to expect from Mandy. A film that stretches the boundaries of what cinema can do, and what it can be in general, a beautifully violent horror film that never relents from unsettling the audience and taking them on this joyfully terrifying journey into the mind of a filmmaker who can only be described as absolutely deranged. Yet, how could I not adore Mandy? It is everything I look for in a film – it is original, beautifully-made and more audacious than any film I have seen in recent years. Perhaps hyperbole will play a major part in how I describe this film, but while there are a number of ways to describe Mandy, none of them are as articulable as one very simple sentiment: it is beyond brilliant, and quite possibly one of the greatest achievements in horror and action cinema of this century, and one that will profoundly please anyone who has an interest in grindhouse or exploitation filmmaking, especially those of previous eras.

Let’s work through this film together, I think its a bit easier that way. For all intents and purposes, let’s suspend all notions of coherency and logical for just a brief moment as we explore Cosmatos’ apocalyptic action horror. I can honestly say I have never seen a film quite like Mandy, and this doesn’t only speak to Cosmatos’ unique cinematic talents, but also to the fact that he is quite possibly a terrifyingly demented individual – but if lunacy manifested in something like Mandy more often, we should open the proverbial gates of Bedlam. I am doubting the notion that Mandy is even a film – its something that I can’t quite comprehend, a complex and thrillingly absurd journey into sheer madness. Mandy isn’t a film as much as it is two hours of unhinged insanity, violent beyond compare and despicably good in how it executes the story. While even the most surrealist of artists do strive to imbue their films with some meaning, Cosmatos throws caution to the wind and presents us with something perhaps not entirely nonsensical (the story at the core is too straightforward to inspire any narrative confusion), but still deliriously strange. Mandy is a wonderful hallucination of a film, one that blurs boundaries, immersing the audience entirely within its story. Despite the grotesque levels of violence and the sheer terror shown throughout this film, you just cannot look away, and it becomes almost hypnotic in its unconventional beauty.

I think everyone can agree with me when I say that we have all been on quite a journey with Nicolas Cage throughout the years. Many of us have seen his various metamorphoses, from serious dramatic actor to the central figure in a career defined almost entirely by poor choices in the more recent stages. From acclaim, arthouse darling to the internet’s most undeniably favourite unstable relative, Cage has been a perpetual present in cinema. Personally, I find Cage to be quite endearing, and the worse the performance is, the more charming he becomes. Mandy, however, is a film that gives Cage some of his best work in years. It would appear that writers are too eager to assert the phrase “best work in years” onto Cage, because whenever he gives a performance even marginally nuanced or complex, we are ready to proclaim the hosannas that signal the return of the Nicolas Cage who was, at one point, one of the biggest stars in the world. Not Mandy. This film gives Cage the opportunity to give a truly magnificent performance, but not through anything traditionally considered skilful acting. What Cage is given to do here allows him free reign to dip into his seemingly-endless pool of excessive tics that define the majority of his latter-career performances, and to exploit them to his heart’s desire.

Mandy is a film that shows Nicolas Cage is finally done caring about being a serious actor – he’s an institution of his own, a machine-like actor who is capable of intensity nobody could ever hope to rival, and one that is more than happy to tone it down and give a decent, subtle performance when it is necessary, but not that we should expect such performances from Cage too often. In my view, let him have it: he’s clearly a talented actor, and despite some of his choices being questionable, he does pander to a clear demographic with most of his recent performances (that demographic being people who have a penchant for camp artifice and gloriously excessive acting that borders on palpably tense and extraordinarily terrible, but still oddly lovable). In essence, Mandy sees Nicolas Cage playing the archetypal Nicolas Cage character on a revenge-driven killing spree, with all semblance of delicate nuance being rendered inconsequential in favour of the relentlessly unhinged performance we pay to see when we opt to watch a Nicolas Cage film. Personally, I welcome this new stage of Cage’s career, where he is capable of refining his excess to the point where it isn’t dulled (quite the contrary), but utilized in such a way where the actor can make fun of himself without being self-deprecating or parodic. If anyone doubts Nicolas Cage as being one of the finest actors working today, I present you with this challenge: if Nicolas Cage is so inextricably awful, then who would have given us the gloriously-entertaining Left Behind, or the magnificently awful The Wicker Man remake, or the stupidly-thrilling National Treasure films? Nicolas Cage has longevity as an actor, and I doubt if his talents were as non-existent as suggested, he would not be getting the work he has been getting over the past two decades, let alone something as extraordinary as Mandy.

While we can discuss Nicolas Cage endlessly, we need to move on, because Mandy is not just another Nicolas Cage action film (remember, the status of Mandy as a film has already been called into question). What Mandy is we still need to debate, but I can confidently tell you what Mandy isn’t – bland, unoriginal or uninspired. Looking purely at the narrative, we can already see how this is a film that simply cannot be compared to anything else – yet it is so wonderfully simple at the same time. Essentially, a couple living in a rural area of the the United States accidentally encounters a cult, led by a failed psychedelic folk musician, who subsequently orders the kidnapping of the titular character by a group of demonic bikers, only to have Mandy burned alive, and setting her husband into a frenzy of revenge-driven insanity, sending him on a wonderfully violent quest of complete vengeance. When you break it down, Mandy is a standard revenge film, along the same lines as Oldboy and the more recent films by Quentin Tarantino. Yet, it somehow manages to be better than all of them (or at least original enough in its own right to stand as a towering revenge manifesto on its own merits). For a film that leaves the audience in a state of awed panic and paranoid angst, Mandy has quite a coherent storyline, one that doesn’t avoid a few allegorical diversions, but manages to remain relatively simple for the sake of focusing on other aspects of the filmmaking process, which essentially are what set Mandy across from the films that others have tried so hard to compare it to.

Yet, very few people will focus too much time on the storyline, not when the visual style of Mandy is ripe for fruitful discussion. In all honesty, Mandy may be amongst the most beautifully-shot films I have ever seen – the use of colour, which works in conjunction with the gorgeous cinematography makes Mandy an exercise in cinematic complexity. It is a visually stunning experience, with Cosmatos and cinematographer Benjamin Loeb working together to create something that is so distinctive, it becomes unforgettable. Mandy doesn’t just leave an impression – it brands an indelible series of moments onto the memories of the viewer, forging images onto our minds that will be almost entirely impossible to ever forget. The visual style of this film has been the focus of much of what has been written about it, and deservedly so: it is a beautifully-composed piece, and everything from the serene moments of tranquillity, to the excessive action sequences, are presented with such effortless sensitivity, with everything in the film, ultra-violent and otherwise, coming across as deeply profound and entirely memorable. Some films rely on action to compensate for narrative gaps or try and emphasize the narrative to make up for what it lacks in more technical skill: Mandy finds the balance perfectly, and presents this story in such spectacular pulchritude.

But let me just be entirely honest – as visually-stunning as Mandy was, as well as how effective its story is, what I liked about it was that it just disregarded conventions in favour of unhinged insanity, as I’ve mentioned before. Mandy is the closest we are ever going to get to pure anarchy being represented cinematically – it is just an extremely violent, endlessly enjoyable and thrilling action-horror that may be quite bleak and terrifying, but it also doesn’t take itself too seriously. This is by no means a humorous film – it is quite arid and uncompromisingly unsettling, but there are moments of such punctilious audacity, it helps diffuse the tension. Where does Mandy peak in regards to its insanity? It is Nicolas Cage snorting what can only be described as a tower of cocaine off a shard of broken glass, or when he lights a cigarette off the decapitated head of one of his adversaries, which just so happens to also be on fire? Perhaps it is the hallucinogenic visions of societal disorder, or when two characters quite literally duel with chainsaws. You can say a lot about Mandy, but to call it unoriginal or anything but audacious seems inappropriate. Love it or hate it, the sheer scope of this film’s intrepid boldness just cannot be denied. It could be described as the most chaotic death metal committed to film, and the score (one of the final produced by the late Jóhann Jóhannsson) is incredible and is significantly responsible for the frantic and anarchic tone of the film as a whole.

Mandy is a film that I doubt will please everyone – it is, after all, not the most pleasant film to watch – violent beyond reasonable comprehension, extremely perverted and unequivocally unsettling, it has a certain quality that both repels the audience and captivates them at the same time. Panos Cosmatos is quite a voice in contemporary cinema, and his acclaimed work speaks volumes to his masterful skills, as well as indicating that he is not a filmmaker who intends to play by the preordained rules of cinema in any way. Mandy is truly one of the year’s best films, and I truly do mean that, because while it may be something almost impossible to comprehend, it features all the elements of a great film – an original storyline, magnificent execution, brilliant performances and a singular vision by the director to bring all of these together and package them in what can only be called one of the strangest but transcendent cinematic experiences I have had in years. Mandy is a masterpiece in no uncertain terms, but I am still trying to figure out exactly what Cosmatos was trying to make here, but regardless of intention, the final product was utterly extraordinary, beautifully-composed and just unbelievably brilliant. Mandy is unlike anything you have ever seen, or will ever so, so take my advice and seek out this gloriously postmodern work of demented art. Believe me, it’s worth every cent you pay and every existential crisis you have afterwards.