Quartile rating: 7/10 · 1 rating
Casey is attacked at random on the street and enlists in a local dojo led by a charismatic and mysterious Sensei in an effort to learn how to defend himself. What he uncovers is a sinister world of fraternity, violence and hypermasculinity and a woman fighting for her place in it.
The Art of Self-Defense is a sharply distinctive deadpan satire on toxic masculinity with a singular, suffocating tone that sets it apart. Jesse Eisenberg delivers a perfectly calibrated performance as the meek, impressionable Casey, and Alessandro Nivola is genuinely unsettling as the Sensei — both are standout pieces of acting work. The film's novelty lies in its dry, almost Brechtian comedic register, which feels wholly its own and sustains a queasy blend of absurdism and dread. The plot is engaging but follows a somewhat predictable cult-indoctrination arc, and the ending, while fitting in tone, resolves a little too neatly given the film's otherwise destabilizing ambiguity. Cinematography is competent and intentionally flat to serve the satire but doesn't itself demand attention.