Clouds of Sils Maria

 Year:  2014

Director:  Olivier Assayas

Screenplay:  Olivier Assayas

Starring:  Juliette Binoche, Kristen Stewart, Chloë Grace Moretz, Johnny Flynn

Running Time:  123 minutes

Genre:  Drama

Maria Enders (Binoche) is an acclaimed, successful actress who is cast in a play called Maloja Snake about the relationship between an older and younger woman.  Twenty years previously Maria had starred as the younger woman, the part that made her name, and now she is cast as the older partner, opposite young American starlet Jo-Ann Ellis (Moretz).  In remote Sils Maria, high in the Alps, Maria and her assistant Valentine (Stewart) cloister themselves to rehearse and prepare the character.  As they prepare and delve deeper beneath the skin of the character, Maria, who was reluctant from the beginning to accept the part, becomes increasingly prey to her insecurities and professional jealousy, as the play begins to increasingly mirror her life.

This is a slow, meditative psychological drama.  For the most part, the film is a two hander between Juliette Binoche and Kristen Stewart as they rehearse and discuss the play, the psychology of Maria's part and the state of cinema, and walk in the spectacular Alpine scenery.  Juliette Binoche is very good in a part that was written specifically for her by writer/director Olivier Assayas, who incorporated elements from Binoche's real life into the script.  Kristen Stewart also gives a very strong performance as the loyal assistant, Valentine.  Despite prominent billing, Chloë Grace Moretz has comparatively little screen time, although she makes the most of it as the young starlet, who is never out of the tabloids or internet gossip sites for her boozing, drugs, fighting paparazzi and police officers, and her older, married boyfriend (Johnny Flynn).  The film is highly allusive, hinting at and referencing things that are never shown or explained, for example Maria often asks Valentine about her relationship with a photographer, but Valentine always evades the questions.  In one scene she returns to the house, apparently deeply upset, having seemingly split up with him, but we never learn what happened.   It is also hinted that Maria and Valentine's relationship may be more than strictly professional, but it is left ambiguous.  This is a film which seems simple on the surface, but is deceptively complex, where a lot is left up to the viewer to interpret in their own way.  Some may find this entrancing, others merely frustrating.  Some of the film is very funny, making fun of contemporary Hollywood cinema.  Maria is embarrassed that her biggest hit was an X-Men film, and she constantly gets offered roles in horror or science-fiction movies (a nun who turns out to be a werewolf and a mutant hybrid), which she is very contemptuous of.  In one of the film's funniest scenes, Maria and Valentine got to see Jo-Ann Ellis' latest movie, a science-fiction film where she is dressed in a red catsuit and matching wig in what looks like a particularly cheesy 1980s episode of Doctor Who.  When Valentine (wearing a Batman tee-shirt) tries to convince Maria that comic book and science-fiction films can be serious and artistic, dealing with complex, serious themes, Maria responds by laughing at her.  The film is beautifully made and stylishly photographed.  The film's title, and the title of the play within the film, refers to a weather phenomenon where the clouds hang low beneath the mountain peaks and move through the valleys giving the appearance of a large snake.

Kristen Stewart and Juliette Binoche in Clouds of Sils Maria