The best way to describe 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society, the gloriously deranged anthology film directed by Esteve Soler, Gerard Quinto and David Torras, is as Monty Python coming into contact with Pedro Almodóvar. Longtime readers will know that when it comes to my personal taste, I hold very few creatives in as much esteem as these two radically different, but extremely important, cultural institutions. There was very little chance that 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society would be anything other than a delight, and it was proven to be absolutely true, with Soler adapting several scenes from some of his stage productions and condensing them into this darkly comic horror film about different groups of people encountering some of life’s most extraordinary, and sometimes even deeply unsettling, idiosyncracies. Presented as an anthology, consisting of seven different stories linked only by the general darkly comical tone and underlying themes of mortality (as well as the occasional reference to the Seven Deadly Sins, one of the most taut of all cultural conventions when it comes to literature), 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society is an irreverent exercise in unhinged absurdity, the kind not even the most deranged of surrealists could have ever concocted. By no means a perfect film, and often quite slight in some of the stories, Soler and his co-directors made something here that defies expectations, and rises above some of the more common shortcomings found in these kinds of films to be an enthralling piece of dark comedy that may not be without its shortcomings, but is rather one of the year’s most eccentric pieces of fiction – so when it starts to take the form of something eerily resonant, we have no choice but to sit forward and watch Soler’s vision with a blend of delight and caution.

As the title suggests, 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society is composed of seven different stories, each one sharing the common theme of looking at the absurdity of life. We’re presented with a motley crew of colorful characters – there’s a married couple that decide they no longer want their adult son and conspire to kill him after revealing the harsh truths of his origin, an elderly pair who seem to be unable to make their television (which seems to be stuck on the image of a desperate African youth, which causes the child to manifest in their apartment and begin haunting them for their complete apathy and undeclared bigotry) function, a man who forgets how to count and terrorizes a random woman who finds herself with the same trouble of not knowing the basic sequence of numbers, an over-zealous real estate agent hoping to sell an apartment that has a dead body hanging from the roof as its main centrepiece, a fashionable socialite who discovers a population of mysterious people living beneath the floorboards of her home that may or may not be slaves to her sinister husband, a philosophical young woman who waxes poetic to a dying man rather than helping him avoid a painful but preventable demise, and a pedantic bride who is suddenly questioning the very idea of commitment with the declaration of “Till death do us part”, much to the chagrin of her patient husband and the unstable, and borderline psychotic, priest who is growing weary of these “picky brides”, and has no qualms in making this fact known.

Each one a standalone story that differs in the message it conveys, but sharing the quality of all being quite absurd pieces that seek to expose some of life’s more unusual quirks in sometimes unexpected ways. There’s very little doubt that what Soler and his co-directors were doing here was bordering on insensitive – the film makes sure that it goes against the grain of political correctness, not giving too much regard to the sensitivity of viewers who might be offended by the often unsettling display of serious issues such as suicide, poverty and death itself. This is not a film that everyone will respond to – some may even consider it a revolting excuse to offend, made by filmmakers who sought out not to represent life, but rather as an excuse to provoke through a series of vignettes that serve very little function. Naturally, this is only a surface reading, because below the insanity of 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society, there’s a broader set of ideas that make this a work of unrestrained genius – how else can we account for the fact that this is one of the most potent satires of the past few years, the rare kind of comedy that may not be afraid of offending the audience, but also isn’t entirely against the idea of ruffling a few feathers and descending into anarchy for the purpose of realizing its chaotic vision of the world. Both as a work of social commentary, and as a piece of unhinged comic energy, there are few films that are quite as effective as 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society, certainly one of the darkest comedies of recent years, and a brilliant, if not deeply unsettling, glimpse into life and it’s challenges, not from the perspective of logic, but rather the deeply ingrained insanity and social anxiety that all of us can readily admit to experiencing from time to time.

All the segments in the film revolve around certain basic concepts, as reflected in each story having a title that refers to the most simple aspects of life – titles such as “Family”, “Solidarity”, “Order”, “Property”, “Work”, “Progress” and “Commitment” are all very much concepts that are common enough to resonate with everyone, and vague enough for Soler to use them as the driving force behind his absurd stories. This is what gives 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society a lot of its energy, how the directors take some really strange ideas and turn them into potent social satire, based solely on how we have a certain curiosity to things that seem familiar, but are far from realistic, as it offers us some form of escapism. This has often been at the root of surrealism as an artistic movement and the reason why so many of the works we find the funniest are those that take reality and warp it only slightly, making it almost uncanny – we don’t necessarily seek to be reminded of the gritty facts of life (the main reason why there are very few, if any, works of genuine comedic realism), but rather to see life presented as something familiar yet slightly offbeat.  The stories in 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society is situated in a recognizable version of reality, one where the general appearance of life is there, differing only in the situations that govern it. Throughout the film, there is always something slightly off, and with the vignettes ranging from mildly eccentric, or almost entirely absurd, they all work towards the directors’ intention of taking hold of the most insignificant minutiae and manipulating it to the point where nothing quite makes sense, which is the most delightful of sensations, because there’s nothing quite as entertaining as a successful work of surrealism – and in 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society, the absurdity is played completely straight, so there’s absolutely no trace of irony or self-awareness, which only makes it even funnier.

The overt theatricality of 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society, combined with great performances from a large cast of established performers (highlights include Emma Suárez as a woman in the midst of an existential crisis when she realizes she’s lost a vital function and Sergi Lopez as the man who incites this problem, Núria Gago as a vicious bride who calls into question the very nature of a few seemingly banal words, and Francesc Orella and Rosa Cadafalch as the overly intimate parents of a young man who decide they would prefer not to have him around) giving brilliant portrayals of these eccentric characters, it’s very difficult to not be entirely compelled by this film. A very methodical work (each segment is the same length, and all converge into a single vague them that could possibly be a reference to the afterlife, with the final scene of the film being both hilarious and utterly terrifying), this is a perfect example of the mastery of the anthology format, something that hasn’t entirely faded, but is still distant from its peak decades before. None of these stories would be strong enough to be films on their own, but when taken as individual segments of a broader existential tapestry, they manage to be deeply compelling and hilarious potent pieces of satire. 7 Reasons to Run Away from Society is an outrageous comedy that may not be for the faint of heart and often veers towards narrative territory that may repel some viewers from ever fully engaging with what Soler, Quinto and Torras are doing here, but still remains an effective satire that manages to make even the most terrifying of existential issues utterly hilarious, which is an impressive feat all on its own, and a significant reason why this is a film that should be embraced as the pinnacle of comedic surrealism, something that doesn’t get the mainstream attention it should. This film may be alienating and repulsive, but it’s never once boring, and for that reason alone, it’s a worthwhile endeavour.