LONDON: Young couple Tom and Gemma (Jesse Eisenberg and Imogen Poots) are desperate to buy their first home together, so when estate agent Martin offers to show them round a new suburban community called Yonder, they forgo their skepticism and drive out to take a look. Given that a vivarium is an enclosure created to observe or study plants and animals, it’s no surprise to viewers that while getting to the development is relatively straightforward, getting out again proves a little more problematic. As Tom and Gemma begin to realize the extent of their otherworldly prison, they receive a package — a baby that they must raise in exchange for their release.
The ersatz family settle into a friction-filled routine. Gemma juggles empathy and frustrated rage, Tom struggles to repress violence towards the child and becomes obsessed with escape, while the preternaturally ageing kid creeps his pseudo parents out by imitating them and screaming in equal measure.
The central conceit of “Vivarium” suffers from unfortunate parallels to a lot of real-world situations right now. Far from making the film feel apt and current, however, the allegories — being trapped inside mind-numbingly repetitive domesticity — only highlight the bloated feel of the story. “The Twilight Zone” is a clear influence on this movie, but the best episodes of that seminal show tended to top out at 30 minutes. There’s no such luck here. The film is overly long and stuffed with too many heavy-handed examples of exposition or plot prodding, which force the narrative where director Lorcan Finnegan wants it to go. By the time the movie lurches into final-third revelations that feel lackluster and unfulfilling, Finnegan is about the only person who cares where it’s going.
While Poots turns in a nuanced performance, punctuating a traceable arc with wonderfully visceral outbursts, Eisenberg, unfortunately, comes across as one-dimensional and unlikeable, with many of his character’s traits used merely as a foil for the couple’s creepy child. Jonathan Aris’ odd estate agent is actually a lot of fun, but appears only during the plot building of the first act. The neighborhood is frighteningly beautiful, but we don’t see anything like enough of it for it to resonate as a character in its own right. There are the ingredients for a great thriller here, but it’s one that would have benefitted from a far shorter stay.
