Spoilers below, I guess.
I stuck with this movie thinking surely there would be some kind of realization or insight at the end that would make it all worthwhile. But, nah, nada, nothing. I found myself rooting for someone to hack Isabelle Huppert's annoying, weird, anorexic, vacant-eyed, manic character into bits within the first 10 minutes of this film but I didn't even get that pay-off. Bah.
May I ask how or why you thought this movie was for you?
ce n'est pas une image juste, c'est juste une image
[deleted]
How does your response serve any purpose other than coming across just as judgemental and angry with me as my own post was about the film?
I had an extremely negative response to the film - in fact it was so negative I felt it necessary to take the time to say so on this message board.
Interestingly, in retrospect, I have wondered if my visceral reaction to the movie may have been what the filmmaker was going for. Perhaps I was supposed to wish for the death of insane white supremist ignorance and denial as personified by Isabelle Huppert's character. And maybe I was supposed to see the futility in wishing it on her since hers was the only main character who survived. If that was the case, the movie did a good job and I have to give credit where credit is due.
If you disagree with my post, why not enlighten me? Maybe you can help me see what the film should have made me feel. What did you gain from the film? I would like to know.
"I've never killed a man, but have read many obituaries with great pleasure." - Clarence Darrow
[deleted]
Thoughtful analysis though I didn't think of Huppert as a white supremacist so much as an ostrich with her head in the sand, believing in her comforts and her work, living in complete denial about her own son, not to mention the changes going on all around her.
I agree with you. I hated the protagonist from the very beginning. Stubborn, naive and selfish; resulting in the death of her whole family. This movie is a complete waist of time.
shareInterestingly, in retrospect, I have wondered if my visceral reaction to the movie may have been what the filmmaker was going for. Perhaps I was supposed to wish for the death of insane white supremist ignorance and denial as personified by Isabelle Huppert's character. And maybe I was supposed to see the futility in wishing it on her since hers was the only main character who survived. If that was the case, the movie did a good job and I have to give credit where credit is due.I think there is something to this. It's entitled 'white material' and as we see in the breakdown the white people, such as the Vials, become objects targeted by the rebels even though those same rebels were neighbours and friends before. Paradoxically Maria Vial does not see herself as 'white material'. She criticises the white soldiers fleeing at the beginning and talks about prizing the land, as she cycles back to the plantation. There is a simultaneous purposefulness and emptiness to Maria's existence: she is devoted to her land and the coffee harvest but so cut off from the people around her both her workers and estranged husband and son.
I'm a fountain of bloodshare
In the shape of a girl
Revolutionow asked THE right question of you. Do a little work, read some of the reviews, get someone's viewpoint other than your own before deciding that a work of art, which so many other people find worthy of admiration, is worthless. Don't be so lazy, even though you might expect that of the wife of Al Swearengen.
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agreed.worthless mess of a film.who were all these crazy bazards running
around the countryside? what's more,who cares?
I'm just curious how these people hear about such films. It's not as if
most of them have discovered her early work.
I mean I think we both know how European films and American ones
differ for the most part. I would think doing a little research
would provide you more about the film and discovering information about pace, atmosphere, etc.
[inject cathexis]
I like many European films and this one is a sodden piece of garbage. The lead is one of the most unsympathetic characters I've ever seen.
shareCare to illuminate in detail why you found it so?
ce n'est pas une image juste, c'est juste une image
Maybe because Huppert's character is willing to risk the lives of her family to keep her pride?
I agree that this movie is beautifully shot with a wonderful use of the camera. Denis did an excellent job of capturing the thematic elements of the characters and had a very effective way of "show, don't tell". I disagree when people say this moving is boring and slow. I love slow paced and atmospheric films (I'm a huge Tarkovsky fan). I don't think this movie could be considered slow, a lot is going on actually.
BUT( and a big one at that) the story is TERRIBLE. what's worse than the story is the protagonist. I hated her from the start. The frustrating thing about this movie is not that the main character is arrogant, selfish and just plain stupid, it's that Denis wants the viewer to be sympathetic for her! NOPE!
I think this movie would of been much much better if Huppert's character was the antagonist, and the son and father were the protagonists. That way the audience would have someone to relate to, unless you're an selfish a**hole. The son and father wanted to break free from the farm and live their own lives but the mother wouldn't let them, which was the main conflict of the film, NOT the conflict of the rebels or the militia. It feels like the only reason the "boxer" was in the movie was to create the conflict between the mother and her workers, it feels contrived.
Final statement. The Denis knows how to use a camera, but she can't tell a story for the life of her. I give it
2/10
I don't think Denis is interested in antagonists or protagonist in the conventional sense. As you suggest, there are a multitude of conflicts taking place that complicate the lives of the characters.
I believe Denis is making a commentary about the potential danger / the dysfunction / tragic consequences that occur(s), when people create an identity for themselves based on a physical space or rigid belief system that isn't "well-grounded." The white foreigners are doing this, as are the African natives. Good or bad, it's human nature at work.
The character of the mother and the son were the most intriguing. They shouldn't be perceived, or should have been portrayed, as universally good or evil. They were caught in this thankless position -- forced into moving to this farm, and trying to make it work for themselves (perhaps not a good thing?). And trying to make it work also means reconciling with outside forces, for example the rebel uprising. As others have mentioned in this board, the son probably hates living in the farm but (misguidedly?) sees joining forces with the rebels as a way of giving meaning and significance to his life (he's rejecting his "white materiality").
Maria Vial may have been harboring the rebel leader via a false or empty sense of compassion toward him and the cause of the rebels. Its what she tells herself to do to maintain this identity she created for herself living in the farm (I don't think it is an identity she is enamored with; I think she hates her existence in the farm, but keeps a straight face, until she abandons the [false] identity at the end and lets her rage/her true self take action).
Being in the farm was imposed upon these two characters by the sensibility of the father-in-law/grandfather (it is because of his actions years before that they are there). As this imposition was not well-grounded, the life or identity one creates for oneself to satisfy this imposed life is bound to crumble.
OK, time to watch an episode of The Brady Bunch.
Well put.
ce n'est pas une image juste, c'est juste une image
The frustrating thing about this movie is not that the main character is arrogant, selfish and just plain stupid, it's that Denis wants the viewer to be sympathetic for her!Nailed it, but as we see in the end, she's also completely lost the plot. I wanted to like this film, but it has so few redeeming features.🐭 share