insularity (major spoilers)

As I understood it, the reason Michel 'snubbed' her phone call was because he was already back at the house with her sister and friends for the surprise birthday party - the immediate scene following was her walking through the door.

I went to see this film with positive expectations following the reviews. However I must say I found it disappointing (there aren't many of us with this opinion on this board). I think a lot of the 'alienated or random' summation you give it comes down to some straightforward flaws. I felt the dialogue was stilted and self-conscious; the acting was distinctly average and unoriginal. Much as I can see why they cast Kristin Scott Thomas - the French, the ability to look haunted and damaged - I've never really warmed to her as an actress: I think she is not as good an actress as she is intelligent, which means that she has to try a little too hard, and is never quite natural enough to play around with emotion and interpretation of the script.

The other main actors were also fairly unimpressive, possibly a result of self-conscious and sometimes randomly emotional dialogue. I can't see the excessive praise given to the actress who plays the sister. Production values were also poor: this is a film distinctly shot on a budget with unimaginative cinematography - I felt like I was watching Home and Away at some points.

I'm not saying this is a bad film at all. It's good - but it could have been much better, with more money, imagination and a better cast (KST is no Cate Blanchett or Jodie Foster - the latter has the nuanced acting and the accent, but there was obviously no money for a superstar). It just didn't stack up to the reviews.

the movie contains a mystery about why she was convicted and jailed, but the main theme of the movie is her insularity. the climax of the movie occurs when the sister wails, "why didn't you tell us!" and, for a film that is so psychologically real about her individual psyche, the interpersonal - the insularity - is really not treated in any satisfying way.

indeed, why didn't she tell anyone? why was this hers to solve and handle alone? (not to mention why didn't she tell other doctors so the boy might get treatment? i'm a doc, and the lab tests sure looked to me like leukemia, which should be treatable. if it was adrenoleukodystrophy, as offered in another thread, well, that is such an obscure disease that you would never diagnose it without several consults) yes, it hits a mom incredibly hard, but why not let others grieve as well?

several of the other characters are way insular as well - and in ways that startled me. why didn't her parole officer, who seemed so open, confide that he was depressed? or, more precisely, why does the director present the parole officer as transparent and vulnerable, when he is really quite deceptive. why doesn't bald budding boyfriend michel tell anyone what actually happened to his late wife (i was imagining he was driving in the car accident in which she died).

for that matter, why does the director have michel chase kst through practically the whole movie only to turn her down when she calls him from the cafe? not that there couldn't be 20 valid reasons, but the movie simply doesn't bother to offer any of those 20 reasons for his change of heart. and then, to make matters worse, why does the director have bald michel do another about face: at the end of the movie, there he is ringing her doorbell again. so what was with the telephone snub?

there is one heck of a lot of insularity in this film, but just what are the writer and the director trying to say about insularity? without further explication, the film by the end seems to me quite alienated or random. when do you let others in, when do you need to keep to yourself? what is the stance of the film?!?

i think of another film about insularity, "blue," by k. kieslowski. in that film the heroine (juliette binoche) also withdraws after a family death and is also brought back out by another character (in this case a wacky neighbor). but in "blue," the withdrawal and the return are clearly portrayed and make sense.

indeed, why didn't she tell anyone? why not let others grieve as well?

why didn't her parole officer, who seemed so open, confide that he was depressed?

so what was with the telephone snub? (by michel, the bald guy)

I also think the ending is not satisfying. I regret I saw the whole movie for that poor ending. It seems the director is the writer of the novel, on which this film is based on. So, I don’t know how such novel could have been successful enough to be made into a film. I cannot imagine a mother punishing herself because her son died of leukemia which she is not responsible at all, unless she is seriously and clinically depressed. Actually, I had thought the son died of AIDS which had been given to him by the father. And the mother perhaps took the burden to protect her husband. And she's more distressed because the husband testified against her. I was tricked by the title.