Maurice Pialat had something of an outsider’s relationship to mainstream cinema, it feels at times, a bit like Cassavetes or similar filmmakers who thrived on improvisation and documenting raw emotional states. This film focuses on Sandrine Bonnaire’s Suzanne, a fantastic debut performance and very much the heart of the film, whose coming of age blends with a sense of rebellion against her dysfunctional family and also, it’s hinted, deriving from depression (perhaps something to do with her family situation). The family, sadly, are the weakest part of the film, at least from an acting point of view (both the mother and the brother are frustrating to watch and come across as particularly and screechingly one note; Pialat himself plays the dad). It certainly is close to the surface, these growing pains that Suzanne is going through, her flings with men and her aimlessness, but for all that the dramas are evident, her own feelings are buried and largely inaccessible to any of those around her. She is a steely mystery at the heart of a messy film, and one that I suspect will grow if I revisit it, but another fine film in Pialat’s oeuvre.
FILM REVIEW: Criterion Collection
Director Maurice Pialat; Writers Arlette Langmann and Pialat; Cinematographer Jacques Loiseleux; Starring Sandrine Bonnaire, Maurice Pialat, Dominique Besnehard, Evelyne Ker; Length 95 minutes.
Seen at home (DVD), London, Saturday 18 July 2020.
filmcentric 