Colibel Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

NekoHomey Purely Joyful Movie!

Contentar Best movie of this year hands down!

Sabah Hensley This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

chaos-rampant We are torn in life by emotions, desires, grievances, thoughts that surge through us and back to create self. We suffer from the pull of events outside of us; but we also suffer more acutely it seems from a life that has no pull anymore, from being every day in the same room without air.This is the essence of modern film for me, indeed what sets modern man apart, it's the baring of this self who, having sated apparent needs, finds himself no closer to fulfillment, the walls closing in, the air being sucked out from life. Neorealist characters could at least point around them to a life of squalor and ruin as explanation. But Antonioni's characters?So I'm after filmmakers who abet stillness and the wisdom that comes from it, looking for a cinema of awareness (never aesthetics). Because most movies can splash a bit of passion and noise about our predicaments. But how to achieve cessation? How to inhabit the world and our self in a way that we come finally to a measure of realization about process?Here is one of the simplest suggestions to the question, all about creating emptiness. It's my first acquaintance with this filmmaker and I'm bowled over that she made this at 24. She must have been a brilliant mind, a woman worth knowing.A woman simply goes about her daily life. She's a lonely widowed housewife, doing chores, preparing food, washing the dishes. She's also a prostitute, Akerman makes a point to reveal this at the very beginning. Her son comes back in the afternoon, she prepares dinner. She has to wake up again at dawn to make breakfast and see him off.We have no plot, no drama, and only the interminable life in between. Small rituals like trying to get her coffee right because she has nothing else to do. There's only her son in her life. Talk between them is little and the boy's habit to not pay her much mind exists on a razor-sharp edge between neglect and ease. It's heartbreaking to see how she spends her whole day tending to menial chores and he just comes in and sits to eat with barely a word. Mothers will able to relate.But this is the whole thing, how we register these moments. It's sparse, simple, minimal pundits say; better yet, it's like a modernist mantra where by repetition we come to acuity and focus about the fabric of emptiness from which sound comes. In our case, life itself, yours and mine.Is it a horrible ordeal? Can we bear it nonetheless, even if less than ideal and not what was hoped for? Is there an exit?Akerman and the regal-looking Seyrig have conspired between them; Delphine will move gracefully and with complete purpose, the film is a series of tasks carried out without complaint or hesitation, Chantal will film simply the room, allowing us emptiness to receive it. It has some of the most exhilarating atmosphere of any film I've seen.Then a pot of overcooked potatoes or a piece of cutlery that slips from her hand can ring far and wide with the vexation building up inside. When she tries to make the same small-talk she finds inane. When she picks up the baby, unsure if even out of affection anymore.The whole film is inverse Cassavetes, including the snuffing of courage at the end (he never does it). Oh it's a great ending that will brand your insides. But she had already done this for me and to leave her crushed like this, are we now more awakened or less?

tuzlak007 After watching a house-wife three hours and twenty-one minutes, mostly without seeing anyone else on the screen, going through her daily routine three consecutive days, it is very easy to say "What a monotonous, tedious, unexciting, and boring film." Also, I should add, during the stages of this most interesting story-telling, the camera never moves. Whatever she might be doing in her small, claustrophobic apartment, we observe Jeanne Dielman (played by exquisitely by Delphine Seyrig) through the fixed eye of the camera. Oh, one more thing: There are hardly any spoken words. And, the film has no music either; we hear only the murmur of the traffic outside.Yet, a twenty-five-year-old, extremely talented Chantal Akerman, within the frame of this very unusual structure, managed to direct an exceptional film, a film that should be part of every movie collection.This movie can be seen as a psycho-drama or as a psychoanalytical (i.e. Freudian) study of a lonely woman who has been living with her teen-age son six years after her husband passed away. Whatever the reason(s) --or motive-- of a viewer could be, this film is a gem. A remarkable work-of-art!

WNYer Vivid, uncompromising portrait of three days in the lonely life of a middle aged widow who manages her apartment, takes care of her young son and turns tricks for support.Experimental film consists of stationary, single take camera shots - some lasting several minutes - giving you a glimpse of the main character's repetitive, mundane existence. Whether its stopping at a café to drink coffee, peeling a batch of potatoes in the kitchen or cleaning each porcelain piece in her living room, viewers sit through each arduous task all the way through. It reminded me of some modern day reality shows where a camera is just parked in a room and viewers watch whatever goes on - only in this case Jeanne is usually the only one there.Delphine Seyrig performance as Jeanne really shines. She is in every scene of the film and really carries it well. It is even more impressive considering that there is very little dialog and that any other characters that appear are peripheral. Seyrig convincingly conveys Jeanne's character and emotional state by simple actions and subtle expressions. This really comes into play on the third day when things start to go wrong and you feel the character is starting to become unhinged.The camera work and framing of the scenes are exceptionally well done and sound is used very effectively to convey Jeanne's suffocating world. The constant tapping of her shoes as she walks across a wooden floor, the repeated clicking from turning lights on and off, or the mechanical sounds of the elevator each time she goes in or out of her apartment building, they all emphasize the obsessive orderliness and emotional detachment in her life.The biggest negative about the film is that it is nearly 4 hours long. Sitting that long watching a person doing menial tasks is a bit taxing. I viewed the film piecemeal over three successive evenings (1 for each day represented) which worked for me. On the positive side, the film does grow on you as you watch it and you feel like a bit of a voyeur peering into someone's life. You feel Jeanne's monotony and growing frustration which lets loose in the final shocking act. It's worth checking out.

hotel-419-417395 This movie is deliberately different, all in the service of telling us something we didn't know.Movies are about movies. The borrow plot, character, lighting, sound editing and camera angles from what went before. Since "Birth of a Nation" introduced close-ups, cross cutting and cutaways in 1915 everyone has adopted that vocabulary for story telling. This movie throws all that out: The camera is fixed and stares at a scene for a very long time. Scenes had to be performed all the way through when they were filmed, because each was done in a single shot.Movies use telescoping of time to compress the happenings of a long period into two hours. This movie tries to avoid that, depicting mundane tasks in their entirety. We watch Jeanne Dielman prepare a meatloaf, step by step, wash the dishes (her back is to us!), smooth the bed, or go shopping.Movie use facial expressions to express feelings. Spoiler alert: When we get strong facial expressions from Jeanne Dielman there is a very good reason. And that only happens once in a three-hour, 21 minute film.Movies use broad strokes to carry the audience along. Spiderman supplements explosions with 3D to keep me occupied. By contrast, this film uses subtle changes. You must watch closely to see what happens.Most movies come to you. This movie requires you go to it. If there is dullness it is among those viewers who think that because they don't get something it's not there to get. There is plenty here but instead of being served to you it has to be harvested. And it is very fresh.