OPUS - Mark Reviews Movies

Opus, A24

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Review by Mark Dujsik | March 14, 2025

Writer/director Mark Anthony Green takes a long time to get to an idea that might make for an intriguing and incisive premise about the potentially insidious nature of celebrity. Almost as soon as that moment arrives, Opus ends.

Before the final minutes of Green's movie, it's an obvious and mostly predictable affair, as well as a half-considered satire and quarter-baked thriller, about the world's biggest pop star and the literal cult with which he has surrounded himself. The musician, by the way, is played by John Malkovich, which is an inspired bit of casting for a deviously charming cult leader. As for the actor's ability to convincingly play a pop star who's more famous and successful than any real one that does exist or has ever existed, he really does make for a creepy but charismatic head of a cult.

With that unfortunate bit of miscasting out of the way, we can mostly ignore it, because Malkovich's Alfred Moretti (a pop star name if one has never heard of the concept, to be sure) is mainly just some eccentric background dressing in this story. Obviously, the plot revolves around his character, although that's not to say it makes him particularly interesting.

Moretti resurfaces after almost three decades in seclusion and without a single word to the public to announce the release of a new album. Everyone's excited, because the man has had almost three dozen songs reach the number one spot on the charts during his career, but Moretti has chosen a select number of people to hear the album before it's on sale.

Listening to his biggest hit in the early part of the movie, it sounds like a kitschy track from the 1980s or '90s that, sure, would be popular for a couple of weeks or even months. When we finally get to hear some of his new material, it's a shock that no one mentions it all sounds a bit familiar for someone who has spent about 30 years supposedly reaching a new level of enlightenment. The little details matter in a movie like this one, which already wants us to believe that a man who whisper-sings and dances as Malkovich does here would somehow become the most famous singer and live performer who ever existed.

The little details matter, too, because Green only hints and waves at some bigger ideas as the story unfolds. It's seen from the perspective of Ariel (Ayo Edebiri), a young reporter at some kind of online entertainment publication. After Moretti's announcement, the invitees to his early listening event receive gift baskets, and while it's little surprise that her editor Stan (Murray Bartlett) gets an invite, it is quite the shock for everyone that a basket arrives for Ariel, as well.

The two take a private jet to Utah and get a ride on Moretti's famous tour bus to his compound in the middle of the desert. Also joining them are TV talk-show host Clara (Juliette Lewis), notorious paparazza Bianca (Melissa Chambers), social media influencer Emily (Stephanie Suganami), and podcaster Bill (Mark Sivertsen), who used to be a radio DJ and Moretti's pal—until the two had a falling out over something. Bill isn't long for this story, by the way, and once Green plays that hand, the plodding plotting and underlying mystery here become foregone conclusions.

Basically, Ariel's the only one who will admit to herself that something is very, very wrong at this ranch—fenced off the rest of the world, filled with people wearing matching outfits and fawning over Moretti, serving as a school for children of unknown origin. To be fair, the other characters invited to the place do suspect that something is off about the ranch, the devoted followers, and Moretti himself, but none of them is willing to say it aloud or even entertain. They're too excited to be in Moretti's presence and be the first members of the public to hear his new album, after all.

What else is there to say about the story, really? Ariel starts talking to Moretti's followers, learning about the religious beliefs they espouse, and searching the grounds for more direct evidence of what's actually happening. The rest don't and start disappearing one at a time, until Green apparently decides that's too obvious and simply hastens a climax into existence.

Structurally, that makes for a poor thriller, but it's arguable that Opus, with its broad characters and setup, is more interested in satire than thrills. In that regard, the notion of a literal cult forming around a celebrity might be amusing, if Green could move beyond it as just a notion. The ending, for example, might have been a better starting point.

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