Claire Denis’ splintered, impressionistic style, leaving much to be fathomed by the viewer, sometimes sparks critical ire. David Denby, for one, writing of “White Material” in the New Yorker, grows bilious at the thought of anyone who might find grace there: “Dreadful, in an aimless, intentionally disjointed way that some people have mistaken for art.” Oh dear. “Some people.” The unbelievable uncouth! Returning to her roots in Cameroon, as well as to her first, French Colonial Africa-set feature, “Chocolate” (1988), Denis’ latest rests on the small yet sturdy shoulders of Isabelle Huppert, as a colonial plantation owner who insists on riding out a revolution as she awaits her family’s coffee-bean harvest. Confusion reigns and the camerawork reflects that, less pointed than the critique of masculinity in “Beau Travail,” less pointillist than the haunting yet near-indecipherable “Intruder,” Denis still works with the suggestiveness of sound and image rather than the flat sum of plot and sociology. Huppert’s character thinks of herself as part of the landscape, unmovable, and Denis photographs her as such: a fact, a feature, and not an interloper—arms stretched to the sky, feet on the dusty red earth. Racial tension seethes, revolution arrives. Some people find it hypnotic. With Isaach de Bankole, Christophe Lambert. 106m. (Ray Pride)
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
Reading Pictures: Movies In Black-And-White Almost nothing has been written about Walter Hill or his great work. A new book, which the director cooperated with, is "A Walter Hill Film" by critic Walter Chaw. There's much I learned even as a lifelong student of Hill's work: "The Warriors." "Streets of Fire." "48 HRS."
Seeing The Elephant: A Review Of Babylon The boisterous, brawling yet melancholy "Babylon," is a variation on film history, but more drawing for drama. It's gaudy and mean, celebratory and sorrowful.
Heart: A Review of Soul The real world is soulful, too, in Pixar's bountiful life of the mind.
Heart of Darkness: A Review of The Batman The three-hour film noir unfolds briskly, an intensive study in the pervasive interplay of power, money and corruption in what seems like perpetual rainy night.
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