Demi Moore is sharing scary photos of a frightening side of her character in the body horror movie The Substance.
In the film, Moore plays Elisabeth Sparkle, a former A-list celebrity-turned-aerobics guru who is fired from her job on her 50th birthday.
The logline for the film reads, “A fading celebrity takes a black-market drug: a cell-replicating substance that temporarily creates a younger, better version of herself.”
Margaret Qualley plays the younger version of Elisabeth, who simply goes by Sue. The Substance, which is written and directed by Coralie Fargeat, also stars Dennis Quaid.
Moore shared behind-the-scenes photos of herself on Instagram Thursday, which show the harsh effects that the de-aging substance on Elisabeth’s body in The Substance. The photos then made the rounds on X—a sampling of which is pictured above.
Other behind-the-scenes photos are too gruesome to be shown in this article but can be seen here.
The Substance marks an introduction for Moore to the body horror subgenre, and with it came its uncertainties.
“I didn’t know how the movie was going to go,” the actor told Variety in early September. “It’s so out of the box. It could have either really worked or been a disaster. To be completely transparent, body horror is not a genre I was extremely familiar with.”
Moore Is Attracting Awards Season Attention For ‘The Substance’
Demi Moore’s performance in The Substance is already on the minds of voters as awards season gets underway. Per Variety, the Gotham Awards on Tuesday nominated Moore for Best Lead Performance.
The Substance has also won acclaim from Rotten Tomatoes critics, who collectively gave the film a 91% “fresh” rating based on 312 reviews. The film has also earned a 74% “fresh” Audience Score on RT based on 1,000-plus verified ratings.
Moore’s performance was specifically lauded in the RT Critics Consensus, which reads, “Audaciously gross, wickedly clever, and possibly Demi Moore’s finest hour, The Substance is a gasp-inducing feat from writer-director Coralie Fargeat.”
The Substance debuted in theaters on September 20. In addition, the film was released Thursday on both streaming video on demand on the Mubi and premium video on demand on such digital streaming platforms as AppleTV, VUDU and Prime Video.
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