Winning last year's Canne's Film Festival coveted Palme d'Or prize and Oscar and Golden Globe nominated for Best Foreign Film at this year's awards season, Ruben Östlund's Swedish set The Square certainly comes to home release with some prestige attached to it but this bum-numbing epic that acts as a darkly humorous expose of modern art culture and more broadly an examination of humankind in general, is the type of film that will split viewers down the middle in regards to love and hate.Following on from his critically acclaimed Force Majeure from 2014, Östlund continues on with his slowly paced and methodical way of story-telling as we here follow Claes Bang's art gallery curator Christian through what feels like a collection of mini-films within the larger whole as the all of a sudden under duress big-shot finds his life hitting a few roadblocks in the lead up to his gallery's opening of an exhibition known as The Square.It's a seemingly simplistic set-up but Östlund's execution is anything but, as Christian's journey entails awkward romantic encounters with Elizabeth Moss's American Anne, a crayon carrying chimp, an extremely abnormal dinner function, an angry child and a viral video that is a catalyst to much of Christian's woes.These occurrences all add up to a whole that combines to create an almost unnerving atmosphere and tone but they don't gel to create a cohesive narrative that feels all that apparent and while many will find messages and themes that are possibly there and possibly not there, it feels like The Square squanders some chances to be a genuinely effective dark comedy/expose as it gets lost in an abundance of over-long and over-wrought scenes that needed a much tighter edit.One aspect of the film that can't be faulted however is Östlund's cast commitment to the cause with everyone giving it their all, with Bang and Moss in particular impressing in their roles, while the films few definitively laugh out loud scenes such as disrupted Q and A and the aforementioned dinner feel like scenes out of a much more well-rounded and engaging film.Final Say - An over-long and overall bloated arthouse offering, The Square has some nice ideas and potentially relevant messages but it's hard for them too shine through when the film around them is such a hard slog to endure.2 viral videos out of 5

'The Square' is visually beautiful, well acted not so subtle (I mean, all is seen on the surface and it doesn't go deeper) satire on modern art and modern society with its political correctness and freedom of expression. Although the modern art is very easy target for parody and satire, 'The Square' does not fall into banal mockery of subject and touches the matter quite briefly. I mean, there are not too many puns towards the art scene. The film concerns more about other, and more serious subjects that definitely needs the discussion - political correctness, freedom of speech and creativity, how far we must go with tolerance, the hypocrisy about the care for weaker ones. All important themes, but the film played too safe too many times. The humor (or satire) could have been darker and sharper. More edgy! Pacing was little bit uneven and the film seemed to drag its feet for the last 35 minutes.

Rubbish. Too bad this movie had potential but didn't deliver. I really feel like I wasted my time on this movie.

The biggest fall of today's humanity is in the fact that you can put it in a little flat square. All around, outside the square, every day, you have a lot of opportunities for compassion, for empathy, to communicate, to touch each other in some way. But, instead of being human, we chose to build the square of empty words, cold videos, full of lies about ourselves, full of excuses. We hide ourselves in the herd of survivors who are desperately trying not to be expelled. What is the cost? Where is the limit of our passivity? Where is the switch? The animals are more human, than humans will ever be, and we should not be allowed to use word: animal, for our evil actions. We are lost in our artistic jungle of civilization achievements. What did we really achieve? Be brave and ask yourself: where is my heart, what have I done, why the square is an empty and death symbol of everything? Then you can watch the film.