The Substance: When Intimacy Becomes Horror

I’ve just seen The Substance—and let me tell you, if you’ve ever wondered what it feels like to have your brain simultaneously melt and explode, this film gets pretty close. It’s like someone took a bottle of lube, a David Cronenberg script, and a handful of LSD, and shook them all together in a blender. Trust me, you’ll need a shower afterward—and maybe some therapy.

But beyond the shock factor (and yes, there’s plenty of that), The Substance got me thinking about an unexpected crossover in film: adult cinema and body horror. On the surface, these two genres couldn’t be more different. One is about sex, intimacy, and desire. The other is about, well, blood, guts, and limbs going where they really shouldn’t. And yet, they both dig deep into our relationships with our bodies, our desires, and our fears. They make us uncomfortable, they make us squirm—and ultimately, they make us think.

Let’s start with body horror. Movies like Titane, Raw, or classics like The Fly are all about pushing the boundaries of the human body, showing us what happens when things go wrong, horribly and grotesquely wrong. But more than just shock value, body horror has always had a way of getting under our skin—literally. It’s a genre that uses the physical body as a metaphor for deeper fears: fear of losing control, fear of transformation, fear of becoming something we can’t recognize. It’s no coincidence that body horror often deals with themes of identity and repression, especially around gender and sexuality. The characters in these films often undergo terrifying transformations that mirror the social and personal anxieties of our real-world identities.

Now, adult cinema—the kind we make at ERIKALUST—has a completely different relationship with the body, but it’s just as radical in its own way. Porn from a female perspective emphasizes agency, pleasure, and diversity, challenging the norm by showing sex through an ethical lens. Here, bodies aren’t objectified; they’re celebrated in all their imperfect, messy, real glory. The focus is on connection, intimacy, and sexual empowerment, especially for women.

So where do these two genres meet? The Substance, for one, is a masterclass in that uncomfortable intersection. While watching it, I found myself bouncing between moments of fascination and disgust, arousal and fear—often within the same scene. The film plays with the tension between attraction and revulsion, much like body horror does. But it also taps into something feminist adult cinema explores: the vulnerability and complexity of human desire.

Both genres share a fascination with the body, particularly the idea that our bodies are beyond our full control. In body horror, this usually manifests in violent transformations—limbs mutating, skin tearing, all that fun stuff. But in ethical adult cinema, this lack of control is framed as something natural, even beautiful. The vulnerability that comes with intimacy—the way we open ourselves up to pleasure, pain, and everything in between—isn’t seen as something to fear, but something to embrace.

The Substance plays with both these ideas, merging the visceral discomfort of body horror with the sensuality of intimacy. And it’s wild. You’ll be gagging one minute, and then, just as quickly, you’ll be thinking about the nature of connection, the limits of our physical selves, and how, really, the body is both terrifying and erotic.

The parallels become especially clear when we look at the role of control. In body horror, the loss of bodily control is terrifying—it’s monstrous. In adult cinema, that same loss of control, when consensual, can be deeply liberating. It’s about trust, about letting go, about allowing yourself to be vulnerable. In both genres, the body is a site of transformation—whether through trauma or pleasure—and both challenge societal norms about what our bodies should do, how they should look, and what they should feel.

David Cronenberg—godfather of body horror and someone who clearly has some interesting ideas about sex—once said, “All good sex is body horror.” And honestly, he’s not wrong. When you think about it, sex is weird. It’s messy, awkward, a little gross at times—but that’s also what makes it real. Both body horror and adult cinema remind us that intimacy isn’t always sleek or polished. It’s raw, and it’s messy. And sometimes, like in The Substance, it’s also really, really gross.

But maybe that’s where the beauty lies. Both genres—whether they’re showing us pleasure or pain—force us to reckon with our bodies in ways we often avoid. They make us face the fragility and strangeness of being human. And whether it’s through an orgasm or a grotesque transformation, both teach us that the body is a powerful, complicated thing. It’s where we experience pleasure, yes, but also fear, pain, and ultimately, the messy, beautiful chaos of life.

So next time you find yourself squirming in your seat—whether it’s from the visceral horror of a body falling apart or the intensity of a deeply intimate scene—just remember: it’s all about confronting the same thing. The body, in all its forms, is both a source of terror and a vessel of desire. And honestly, after watching The Substance, it’s never been clearer that the line between those two is much thinner than we like to think.