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

High Life

Year of Release: 2018
Director:  Claire Denis
Screenplay:  Claire Denis and Jean-Pol Fargeau, story by Claire Denis
Starring:  Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, André Benjamin, Mia Goth
Running Time:  110 minutes
Genre:  Science-fiction, horror, drama

A group of death-row inmates are sent on an expedition into deep space to attempt to extract energy from a Black Hole.  The expedition has been sold to them as an alternative to the death penalty, but in reality they have no way of ever returning to Earth.  On the long voyage the prisoners are subjected to a series of medical experiments by the sinister Doctor Dibs (Binoche).  As time goes on the tensions between the prisoners, in the close quarters of the increasingly run-down spaceship lead to madness and violence.

This is the first English-language film, and the first science-fiction film from critically acclaimed French director Claire Denis.  It has to be said that for anyone looking for sci-fi action-adventure, you will not find it in High Life.  Told in a fragmented, non-linear style, this is a slow, meditative film, punctuated by brief bursts of graphic violence, and explicit sex and nudity.  The prisoners are kept drugged throughout most of their voyage and speak to each other in slow, hushed tones.  The film opens with Robert Pattinson's Monte, who has been condemned for killing his friend over a dog as a child, alone on the spaceship with his baby daughter.  The rest of the crew and prisoners are all dead, and the bulk of the film is taken up with flashbacks to how the prisoners met their fates and how Monte came to have a child in outer space, and flashforwards.  Pattinson gives an icy performance as Monte, usually calm and introverted, but given to bouts of violence.  Juliette Binoche is also memorable as the disturbed and frustrated Doctor Dibs, who uses the other prisoners for sex and experimentation.  The film is frequently aching slow and deathly dull, punctuated by genuinely shocking scenes (including scenes of sexual assault), and hauntingly beautiful images.  The film is at it's best in the later scenes with Monte and his teenage daughter (played by Jessie Ross), which provide the only touches of warmth and humanity in the film.  I did not enjoy this film, I probably won't see it again, and yet there are moments that I think will stay with me for a long time.

Jessie Ross and Robert Pattinson blast off in High Life

    

Ghost in the Shell

Year of Release:  2017
Director:  Rupert Sanders
Screenplay:  Jamie Moss, William Wheeler and Ehren Kruger, based on the manga The Ghost in the Shell by Masamune Shirow
Starring:  Scarlett Johansson, Takeshi Kitano, Michael Pitt, Pilou Asbaek, Chin Han, Juliette Binoche
Running Time:  106 minutes
Genre:  Science-fiction, action, cyberpunk

In the future, cybernetic enhancements to humans are commonplace.  Major Mira Killian (Johansson) is the first of a new breed, a human brain placed in a synthetic body.  She works for the elite anti-terrorist bureau Section Nine, on the trail of a new type of cyber-criminal who uses people's implants to hack into their minds and souls (or "ghosts") to control them.  As she pursues this mysterious figure, the Major begins to uncover disturbing secrets about her past.

The 1989 manga series The Ghost in the Shell by Masamune Shirow, has already inspired several animated movies and TV shows in it's native Japan, most notably the groundbreaking 1995 anime classic.  All remakes tend to provoke controversy among fans of the originals, and this was especially true for this film, an American remake of a distinctly Japanese story, and the casting of Scarlett Johansson provoked furore, with accusations of whitewashing.  I am not going to go into the argument here, because I am not best placed to discuss it.
The film is an exciting science-fiction action, that has the feel of a very 1980s or 90s cyberpunk thriller.  The action is exciting and the visual effects are stunning, creating an eye-popping city of the future.  It's the visuals that really impresses here, and it needs to be seen on the biggest screen possible, if you can, try and see it in IMAX.  For all the criticism, Scarlett Johansson gives a fine performance, as the Major.  Her distinctive statuesque beauty is perfect for a robot.  Fans of the original should be warned that a lot of the plot details are altered, much of the philosophical and spiritual elements have been excised, and a new conspiracy mystery has been added.          
Fans of futuristic action-adventures will probably find plenty to enjoy here, but aside from all the visual wonder, it just feels kind of ordinary, without the depth and richness of the original.

   Scarlett Johansson in Ghost in the Shell