‘Under the Skin’ screens with live orchestra at the Regent

There are plenty of unsettling details in Jonathan Glazer’s film “Under the Skin” -- like Scarlett Johansson luring men into a flesh-dissolving lake, and a cast of extras that didn’t know they were being filmed. But perhaps the most unnerving aspect of the film was its score.

The transfixing, sometimes piercing orchestral arrangements came from Mica Levi, the 26-year-old British composer who brushed with indie fame fronting the experimental band Micachu and the Shapes. Her work on “Under the Skin” vaulted her to a whole new level of regard, however, winning acclaim that likened her work to Jonny Greenwood’s arrangements for P.T. Anderson’s “There Will Be Blood.”

Now she’s returning to the film’s score for a live performance at downtown L.A.’s newly reopened Regent Theater.

Levi will conduct a 25-piece orchestra playing her scraping, haunting arrangements for two screenings of the film on Jan. 6. The orchestra draws from members of several renowned new-music ensembles, including Wordless Music Orchestra and L.A.’s wild Up.

The Times’ Betsy Sharkey said that the film “feels like a genesis moment — of sci-fi fable, of filmmaking, of performance — with all the ambiguity and excitement that implies. It’s as if director and star have gone into some alien space to discover what embodies a person, exposing the interior dynamic of psyche and soul and its relationship to the exterior.” She also had high praise for the score, saying it will “linger and unsettle long after the lights have gone up.”

Tickets for both showings go on sale Friday, Nov. 21 at 10 a.m. Just be sure not take any rides home from strangers in vans after the performance.

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