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Every writer knows just how unsettling it can be: the suffocating, almost purgatorial feeling of writer’s block that maybe will never clear. James (Alexander Skarsgård) has been tormented by it since the release of his one and only novel some six years ago. At the start of Infinity Pool, Brandon Cronenberg’s conceptually clever but increasingly wearying new movie, we cross paths with him and his rich, long-suffering wife, Em (Cleopatra Coleman), during his latest attempt to induce inspiration. The couple has landed at a resort on the blissful shores of the fictional island of Li Tolqa (the movie was mostly shot in Šibenik, Croatia) hoping to seize on the magic that sometimes can strike when you get a change of scenery. But the vacation quickly proves mostly an extension of a cloistered, moneyed existence financially abetted by Em’s literary-giant father. Guests are forbidden from leaving the resort grounds — any other part of Li Tolqa is supposedly overrun with the combination of crime and violence and poverty suggested to spell immediate death for the straying filthy-rich — so there isn’t much to do that couldn’t be done at home besides trying new dishes and wading into unfamiliar pools.

A frisson of excitement ripples through the trip — at least for James — when he and Em meet Gabi and Alban (Mia Goth and Jalil Lespert),  a couple that vacations at this resort regularly. Gabi professes to be a fan of James’ book; a tentative couples friendship blossoms enough so that, when Gabi and Alban suggest they all sneak away for a beach day despite all the barbed-wire fencing coiling around the resort grounds and the explicit instructions not to, James and Em agree to tag along. The forbidden shores and the drive to get to them are nice. But memories of them curdle when, on the way back, the headlights on the quartet’s stolen convertible start flickering and James, who’s driving, lethally hits a farmer. They opt not to call the police because of Gabi’s frantic assurances that a fair trial and a nonfatal prison stint can’t be promised. James is arrested anyway the next morning.

Read the full column on South Sound.