PARENT TRAPS

“Beau Is Afraid” and “Everything Went Fine.”

- ANTHONY LANE

Ari Aster’s horror film follows an anxious only child, played by Joaquin Phoenix.

With a muffled howl and a dull boom, “Beau Is Afraid” gets under way. What are we listening to? Are we in a U-boat, perhaps, with depth charges exploding nearby and the hull beginning to crack? Nothing so exciting. The location is a human birth canal, and the camera is taking us on a trip toward the light. A slap, a wail, and a new child is launched upon this great stage of fools. We also hear the remonstrations of the baby’s mother, who, far from being overwhelmed with joy, sounds furious—no surprise, since “Beau Is Afraid” is written and directed by Ari Aster. As we learned from his previous movies, “Hereditary” (2018) and “Midsommar” (2019), the untraumatized life is not worth filming.

Rumor had it that “Beau Is Afraid” would be three hours long. Not so. It is one whole minute shorter than that. Rejoice! Much has changed since 1942, when Val Lewton started work as a producer at R.K.O. and received specific orders: no film was to cost more than a hundred and fifty thousand dollars, or to last more than seventy-five minutes. From those tough restrictions came a bunch of enduring frighteners, including “Cat People” (1942) and “The Seventh Victim” (1943). “Beau Is Afraid” is the opposite of Lewtonian; its adventures in neurotic obsession appear both unguarded and unconfined.