Cannes 2025 Short Takes: Ari Aster's 'Eddington' is Mystifying and Exhausting

In May 2020 (the early days of the pandemic), a mayor and a sheriff in a fictional small town in New Mexico called Eddington, are in a face-off that ends in mayhem and dead bodies — as it must because this is an Ari Aster film. Aster, who has also written the film, uses this scenario to create a portrait of America, the devastating mental toll of the lockdown, the fog of lies and half-truths, disease as a physical and psychological state, social media as an agent of chaos and the inevitable collapse of social structures and eventually, human beings.  

Joaquin Phoenix plays the conservative sheriff Joe Cross and Pedro Pascal is the liberal Mayor Ted Garcia. Garcia wants to follow mask mandates; Cross, who is asthmatic, doesn’t think it’s necessary because, he insists, there is no COVID-19 in Eddington. Their combative relationship is further complicated because Garcia has a complicated — perhaps sexual history - with Cross’ wife.  Cross’ frustration mounts, and one day he decides to run for Mayor himself setting up the stage for a direct confrontation.

Eddington plays as satire but then moves to a theatre of the absurd.  There are a few memorable lines — a cop in Cross’s department casually remarks that blacks hate Hispanics because they are “fake minorities who are taking their coupons” — and some sequences that locate Aster’s signature mix of ghastly and riveting.  But the lack of dramatic tension eventually weighs down the film, which runs for 145 minutes. Eventually, Eddington becomes exhausting and mystifying, but not in a good way.  I’m still trying to decipher what the ending meant.