Vendredi soir

Claire Denis uses close-ups better than anybody since Sergio Leone. Agnes Godard is amazing. A Denis film almost always has a human warmth few other filmmakers achieve with their films, even if it's their intention to do so. All these qualities are present in "Vendredi soir", yet I felt it was significantly weaker than the three Denis films I had already seen: "Chocolat", "Nenette et Boni", and "Trouble Every Day". It's not that the film is 'slight' or that it doesn't have much narrative drive that bothered me, either, but that it never took on the sort of gravity I thought it should have. Moreover, the film falls apart toward the end, when it should have come together. The opening stages of the film, with Godard's camera taking us through Paris were absolutely gorgeous, the first few scenes after the two main characters meet were great, especially the brilliant impressionistic montage after Jean unexpectedly takes over driving Laure's car (accompanied by a Hitchcockian musical score), but when they actually get together and have sex the film just falls apart. Here's a film which is technically brilliant (direction, cinematography, acting, Dickon Hinchliffe's great debut score), formally interesting, but which just doesn't have enough in it to justify even its short length.

The traffic jam sequence alone stands as an amazing and lyrical study of the rhythms of stop and start driving. The two lovers are so anchored in the magnetism of the present. This movie is a homage to human nature, and sexual attraction consummated. Also, I absolutely love that the film accepts and cherishes the moment as the lovers do. It's very French.

This movie is not for the sort of casual movie-goer who must have a plot driven, dialogue heavy entertainment vehicle in order to be satisfied. This film is typical Denis: intensely visual, with sparse dialogue and a very minimal plot.

The premise of the film is a simple one. A woman about to move in with her lover is caught in a traffic jam during a Paris transit strike. She picks up a stranger, and they have a one-nighter.

The film's focus is the little things that make up sexual attraction, the situations, the glimpses, the attitudes, the predilections, etc. It manages to present this in an almost completely visual way without ever becoming dull, pretentious, or difficult to watch. The film has a minute logic to it which manages to pull the viewer along from scene to scene using humor, suspense, and a good deal of empathy for the central character.

This film invites one to reflect on the way in which sex relates to the variety of life's anxieties: anxieties over self-image, anxieties over one's future, anxieties over one's significance, etc. It also provides an interesting vantage point from which to view the over-romanticized over-serious status that sex is given in main-stream American cinema.

Go to this film with the intent of viewing a wonderful piece of art. There is some work required on the viewer's part, but it's worth the effort.

Claire Denis sure knows the French woman's mentality. She is very sly in presenting us this story, that on the surface tells us one thing, but deep down, it has nothing to do what we are actually watching.

The transit strike plot, with Laure sitting in traffic and going nowhere, is played too long. We all get the idea of the boredom and frustration of the driver caught in similar circumstances. That part of the film can drive the viewer nuts, since nothing happens.

Laure doesn't feel any remorse into picking up Jean, who is obviously stranded, or is he?. Their conversation doesn't reveal anything, yet, one can feel where this is leading to: somewhere where Laure and Jean can copulate to their hearts content.

The clue of what's to come takes place after they have an espresso at the cafe. Jean asks for change to go downstairs to the vending machine for a 4 condom pack. Oh la la... Jean is not a casual sex offender, he must protect himself, as well as the woman he takes to bed. Casual meetings such as these can be very dangerous!

The scenes in the hotel are well staged. In fact, there is nothing shocking, or done in bad taste. When Laure and Jean are making out, their behavior is very chaste, without French kisses, (I wonder if Pres. Bush would call them Liberty kisses?...) is a let down. But Jean and Laure do it very stylishly and with decorum.

Jean, obviously, is not a one-woman man. After all he has more condoms in his pocket and when he is in the pizzeria, he spots another woman who makes it known she wants to play with him downstairs.

At the end of the film we watch Laure leave the hotel room running into the deserted streets with a grin on her face. She'll go now to her own lover as though nothing had ever happened that night. She is a woman empowered by her own will to have fun, yet not take it too seriously, or hurt anyone. Perhaps she's laughing at her own sense of adventure having done something that perhaps no one will ever know.

Both of the principals are very effective. Veronique Lemercier and Vincent Lindon play very well together. The director is perhaps telling us that there is still hope for all of us, non movie star types, to have fun and meet a partner for the night, have great sex on the next transit strike, if we are in Paris.

I very much like how this film begins, and it is a creative aspect to have a story line start out of being stuck in traffic. Yet, about 1/3 of the way into the film, it begins to become a bit bizarre, when the man enters her car. Everything seems a bit surreal and things do not always follow logically. My explanation, and what I think makes the film better in retrospect, is that everything that follows may not have actually happened. It seemed to be all too perfect, and she did everything without a single qualm. We were already shown that she was a bit apprehensive about leaving her current comfortable, and the fact that she entered a fantasy seems quite normal under that sort of stress. Nonetheless, whether you believe it was a fantasy or it really happened, it is poetically shot and deserves to be seen, to make ones own decision about the film.