YMMV / Under the Skin

• Award Snub: Not that anyone really expected it to be recognized in such a great year for movies, but not getting a nomination for Best Original Score at the Oscars is pretty unfortunate. Mica Levi eventually got a well-deserved nomination in that category for their equally mysterious and haunting score of Jackie in 2017, only to get snubbed over La La Land.
• Awesome Music: Mica Levi's gleefully mysterious dark-ambient score. It honestly sounds nightmarish at times, particularly the tracks "Creation" and "Lonely Void". Other tracks, like "Lipstick to Void," manage to mix a distorted sensuality with nightmarish tension, while tracks like "Love" are downright beautiful.
• Best Known for the Fanservice: Many people only know the film as the one where Scarlett Johansson gets naked onscreen for the first time (even though in the context of the film, her nude scenes aren't particularly erotic).
• Critical Dissonance: Earned high marks from critics (with some saying it's one of the best films of 2014), but received a much more divided response from audiences, and made little money.
• Memetic Mutation: A paparazzi-captured context-void image from the scene in which the alien trips and falls on the street evolved into the "Scarlett Johansson Falling Down" meme.
• Misaimed Fandom: Some people only like the film because it showcases Scarlett Johansson naked, which is rather ironic considering the extent to which Honey Trap is in effect here.
• Nightmare Fuel: See here.
• This Is Your Premise on Drugs: The film could be described as Species on acid.
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: Between the enigmatic, sexually predatory alien and her hormone-bloodied victims, the film is very short on sympathetic characters or compelling conflict. The alien does seem to get better later on, but it's too little too late, and the story spills into full-on Evil Versus Evil at the end when she's attacked and killed by a would-be rapist. The deformed man is essentially the only sympathetic character who is explored in any real depth, though the wetsuit-wearing camper exhausted himself saving a man from drowning.
• Visual Effects of Awesome:
  • The scene where the alien removes her skin at the end is an incredible job by the makeup department.
  • The bizarre trap-floor that victims are sucked through seconds after the alien was walking on it. The crew have said that the floor of the pool was an elevator platform, but neglected to say what the black liquid was.

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