The big disaster of Cannes arrives, and it’s almost 4 mind- and ass-numbing hours of twerking
Image: Photo: Cannes Film Festival Film Features Cannes Film Festival
One party animal on screen tells another that “It’s the end of everything,” and I finally lose count of the number of films at this festival that have vocalized the fatalism of our time, the nagging feeling that we all may be hurtling toward a point of destructive conclusion. Uttered during one of the last screenings on my last day at Cannes, his words also remind me, in a smaller sense, that another surreal, jam-packed year on the Croisette is drawing to a close. Am I melancholy? I’d feel more so in the moment if I weren’t hoping for a third meaning in the line that sadly doesn’t arrive, a promise of imminent reprieve from the film containing it, instead of something closer to a midway marker in what I can now safely identify as the endurance test of this rapidly elapsing fortnight.
The programmers, in their infinite sadism, saved the worst (and the longest) for close to last. Mektoub, My Love: Intermezzo (Grade: D) is a baffling passion project whose cruelly protracted runtime is eclipsed only by the monumentally tedious way it fills it. For an interminable three and a half hours, the Tunisian-French director Abdellatif Kechiche numbed our asses (and minds) with nothing but ass: a parade of gyrating, jiggling flesh, belonging to a group of hot but terminally boring French twentysomethings on summer vacation, burning a seemingly endless evening at a nondescript nightclub where the film—after a brief and comparatively enthralling prologue on the beach—strands us for its shapeless entirety. That this colossal bore, the walk-out disaster of Cannes (à la Sea Of Trees or The Last Face, only twice the fucking length of either), earned a spot in the competition lineup is the only evidence you could ever need that once you’ve gotten into this club, you’re in.
The last time Kechiche was at Cannes, he won the Palme D’Or, for his nearly as long but almost unfathomably better Blue Is The Warmest Color, which actually put its three hours to engaging use. This time, it’s as though Kechiche has taken the basics of that coming-of-age epic—talk, sex, young people exploring themselves and each other—and stripped it of all drama, structure, and character. As its subtitle suggests, Mektoub, My Love: Intermezzo is technically a sequel, the second installment of a trilogy Kechiche began a few years ago with an adaptation of a novel by François Bégaudeau, who wrote and starred as himself in another Cannes winner, The Class. Kechiche actually sold his own Palme to pay for the completion of the original Mektoub (did he sweeten the deal by throwing in his craft and good sense, too?), which producers pulled financing on during post-production, in what I can only see as proof that sometimes the system does work. The film premiered at Venice two years ago to withering reviews, and never opened in the States, which left some of the American press here in Cannes wondering if we’d be able to follow the plot of the new one.
To which I now ask: What plot? Mektoub spares a few minutes here and there for the woes of Ophélie (Ophélie Bau), who’s engaged to be married in three weeks but pregnant with the child of her lover. Otherwise, we’re talking wall-to-wall banal conversation and twerking; it’s no exaggeration to say that roughly half of the movie is made up of shots of young women congregating around a stripper pole and methodically, joylessly setting their every muscle to vibrate. Kechiche also includes one sequence of explicit, un-simulated oral sex in a bathroom, and it doesn’t take a puerile interest to recognize it as the movie’s highlight, if only because it breaks up the sheer monotony and emotionless torpor of the dance floor “scenes.” At the same time, as someone who defended the sex in Blue Is The Warmest Color as justified and even beautiful in the context of its first-love narrative, I’m starting to get a serious Larry Clark vibe from Kechiche, who’s now built three whole movies around ogling. (The movie’s nonstop bared skin sits uneasily with the reports of unprofessional conduct on the set of Blue, as well as recent sexual assault allegations.)
As a glutton for punishment (cinematic and, well, otherwise), I almost have to admire the uncompromising uneventfulness of this movie, which is nothing if not daringly committed to its dubious goal of giving Girls Gone Wild the grueling slow-cinema treatment. I can even make some kind of intellectual case for Mektoub as an immersive, naturalistic, basically real-time plunge into the hedonism of early-20s life: a drunken night out rendered in all its horny anti-splendor. In practice, however, the film is a slog of epic proportions, its trancelike repetitiveness threatening to destroy this critic’s fragile grasp on time itself, ushering me into a new plane of star-child boredom. All the same, I’m perversely glad I forced myself to sit through it. Cannes wouldn’t be Cannes without an outsize folly, and given the venomous reception to Mektoub already, this may well have been my only chance to experience—nay, endure—the film on the big screen. Count me out of the next one, though, assuming Kechiche has any other awards lying around he can pawn to cover the budget.
If Mektoub suffers from, to put it generously, a lack of incident, one of the films it’s competing against (which is also putting it generously) has basically the opposite problem. The Traitor (Grade: C+), from Italian director Marco Bellocchio, is nothing but incident. It’s a decades-spanning biodrama about Tommaso Buscetta (Pierfrancesco Favino), the Mafia boss who betrayed his Sicilian syndicate by turning informant in the 1980s, eventually entering Witness Protection in the United States and opening the door for future defections in the ranks of Italian organized crime. Bellocchio (The Conviction, fellow Cannes selection Vincere) operates in his usual strikingly operatic mode, and he has plenty of exciting material to dramatize here, from the usual gangland slayings that set the plot into motion to the absurdities and confrontations of the Maxi Trial, in which prosecutors indicted nearly 500 members of the organization. (It’s still considered the largest trial in world history.) But with a true-crime canvas so large, Bellocchio arguably required a more Mektoub-sized running time; this one runs a comparatively brief two and a half hours, and it ends up privileging an endless deluge of dates, names, and events over providing its title character much of an arc. There’s just no real perspective on Buscetta, which separates this brisk but uninvolving history lesson from the truly great mob movies. I was a little bored with it, too, honestly.
Later today: A brief note on a competition title that’s still under embargo. And I’ll close my coverage by trying and undoubtedly failing to guess what will win the major prizes at Cannes this year, with thoughts on my favorites of the festival, too.
288 Comments
Are you sure Brett Ratner didn’t produce the movie?
Whoa! I haven’t seen this photo in a long time! It’s working on me like Proust’s madeleine!
À la recherche de gros culs.
…with the first portion, Swann’s Swank’s Way?
If only because it scans better may I suggest “à la recherche de grosses foufounes”?
It’s maybe the greatest photograph ever taken.
He will not lie.
AVClub classic
There was a link in the article about Commando yesterday to a blogspot movie review by Burl!
I saw that too, and oh the memories. In the Savage Love this week I posted as Riker (you have to read the letters, and especially the comments to truly understand…and I apologize in advance) because while I am not the Riker from the TNG reviews long past, it’s still good to remind us few that remember that there were good times.Burl was one of the few crackpots that I loved for the sheer ludicrousness of his posts, haha! I’m still convinced Lobsters1 was a complete inside joke between all the old AVC reviews just to see who would take the bait.
I commented, but bailed before Riker made his altogether appropriate appearance in the thread. Burl was just so delightfully upbeat. It was fun to watch people try and mess with him because he was so sincere that they just…gave up. His movie review was perfectly Burl. I miss the pre-Kinja before times.
Any mention of Ratner makes me immediately think of the story where a young actress came to Ratner’s house, where he was out back barbecuing in his robe. When she approached, he opened his robe and started wanking his pathetic dong with a barbecue and grease covered hand.For all his cinematic atrocities, that story may be worse.
Remember when Bieber’s face was crudely photoshopped onto this picture for that article about him liking butts? The article and the accompanying picture are art.
*with a French accent*“They called me, how do you say it, a whole ass…”“You mean an asshole?”“Yes and that too!”Thanks RDR2
Can you positively deny that you are not Sean O’Neal?
I had no idea Lea and Adele were so mistreated during Blue is the Warmest Color. It’s insane that the shoot was meant to take 2 months and it ended up taking 5! That this director got work again is unconscionable.
I didn’t know about that whole thing either. I just now read the recap of the events on Vulture, and it of course sounds awful. In cases like this, I’m never sure how best to respond. It’s not pleasant to watch scenes, even effective scenes, when you know that the results were achieved by or despite the mistreatment (whether or not that’s the best word for it).I recently rewatched The Adventures of Baron Munchausen and really couldn’t take my mind off of what Sarah Polley had described regarding the unsafe conditions she had to work under as a child actress. Difficult shoots are par for the course, but there’s a distinction between Ridley Scott running a tough set and a male director mistreating and creating an unsafe environment for actresses and child actors.Seydoux said she’d never want to ever work again with Kechiche. Would she rather I watch the finished product and not give it any more attention/money?
a
and it was a lovely film, to boot. Sadly, not uncommon in the film industry.
Is twerking still a thing?
Big Freedia headlined the 4/20 neighborhood block party in Chicago this year, and based on how much the stage shook and rattled during their performance, twerking is most definitely a thing
“4/20 neighborhood block party in Chicago” – yeh, I’m out . . .
I think it’s now a franchised workout cult like Crossfit generating hundreds of millions in revenues.
they got tax-free status?
I misread the latter half of your comment as “…like Crossfit gyrating hundreds of millions in revenues”.
It has always been a thing, and it will always be a thing… when the stars all go dark the black holes will be twerking ever outwards into the endless night.
Post this up on instagram for a billion likes. That is the American way.
This is the MCU alternate universe in which Sir Mix-a-lot is The Watcher, right?
sounds racist.
Is people shaking their asses still a thing? Are you seriously asking this question?
Right? If you have some dude standing there, and some chick is shaking her ass right in front of him, of course that dude still thinks it’s a thing.
Seriously. The word may be new but people have always done this.
Also, if I can get a little recognitions-y here, it’s been an expression of bodily freedom for black women for far longer than it’s been in the mainstream, and that’s probably where it will return in the future. The term ‘twerking’ is derived from 90s New Orleans, and the actual dance can be clearly traced back to Cote d’Ivoire. So even this current form has existed since at least the mid-20th century.
Good stuff.
The word “twerking” goes back to the 90s NOLA bounce scene, but the type of dance dates back to traditional African dances like the Mapouka from Cote d’Iviore. And tbh I’m pretty sure people have been shaking their asses everywhere in some form or another since the beginning of fuckin time. But yes, most white people think Miley Cyrus singlehandedly invented twerking at the 2013 VMAs
No person anywhere thinks that
I want to believe you, but have you been to Iowa?
you don’t spend enough time with middle aged white people then
not that seriously.
Twerking is more specific than that, gramps
I keep telling you, nobody has any idea what you’re saying. it’s a string of unintelligible grunts and it’s somehow been getting worse
Twerking is more specific than the extremely specific dance with extremely specific origins that he identified? Sure, chief…And whether or not peoplle called it twerking, that dance has absolutely existed for quite a long time. I specifically remember many times in my 90’s high school days where people did that exact dance. We just didnt call it twerking at the time.
Zoomba still is a thing as well – so get used to it.
NO! I refuse!
It’s been a thing for a few decades now.
Such a cheeky question….
Milkshake gotta shake, yo
How else you going to get all the boys, and Nas, to the yard.
Oh, I know, but I’m running out of room in my yard for boys!
The movie is set in the 90s, so I think the reviewer just doesn’t know what twerking means.
Twerking has been around since 2 Live Crew was telling folk to make their knees touch their elbows. And that was in the 80s.It’s not new or a recent thing and was def a thing in the 90s – whether or not what they were doing in the film constitutes twerking is something else entirely.
Twerking absolutely was a thing in the 90’s and just wasnt referred to by that name, so i think this commenter (you) just doesnt know what they are talking about and comes across as a smarmy and incorrect jerk.
I’m guessing its a word our non-clubbing friend used to describe dancing.
It’s always been a thing to certain communities with a decent amount of melanin. It’s just white people (Miley) cashed in on it and made it a fad. It will always be a thing despite Karen’s pancake butt.
that’s just normal dancing now.
God help me, I’m picturing Dowd standing in his underwear in front of a mirror in his otherwise-empty hotel room in Cannes trying to figure out how to move his ass independently of the rest of his body.I need a bath. In acid. Forever.
Dowd frowns and places one hand on his stomach and another on his lower back. He then stiltedly thrusts his pelvis forward.“No, it’s more of a tuck…”He pushes into his lower back harder, and arches his back as far as it can go. He turns around, looks over his shoulder, sighs, sits down, and starts writing.I tested this hypothetical scene with a willing unathletic white male participant, and can verify its authenticity.
THE GOGGLESTHEY DO NOTHING
Seriously, I’m fucking cackling at this. It’s like a deleted Wes Anderson scene.
~seesaws hand side-to-side~
Twerking is spinal fusion on a layaway plan.
Dancing is about butts now.
Let’s just be glad it’s only a parody.
To be fair, an entire generation of white girls decided that “sort of popping my back to make butt shake a little” = “twerking,” which, no. They’ll move on shortly.
Kechiche is a pig. The evidence has been overwhelming and now I read recently he was accused of sexual assault. WTF?!
Ubiquitous online pornography has seriously lowered the demand for euro art-smut.
Funnily enough, after watching Eurovision last Saturday, my friend put up this British dating show called Naked Attraction that had the 6 prospective dates all naked while the one person choosing them was clothed and made comments about their body. Full frontal nudity and everything right on Youtube. Even though we were all gay men and see penises on the reg, there was something titilating about seeing unblurred naked people on Youtube.
I felt the same way, and ended up watching a whole bunch of it. It’s a ridiculous concept of course, the pairings basically never work out beyond the first date, but there’s something about it. Of course porn has plenty of naked bodies, but this is a different way of looking at them, and it’s interesting to see how people evaluate. There’s a bunch of episodes on PornHub for anyone interested
I watched it once and it was surprisingly interesting rather than titillating. A guy ruled out a girl in first round where he could only see the womens’ legs because he thought her legs were too skinny. Then she walks out and she’s model pretty. The reaction of the guy was priceless.
Yes, I’ve remarked on that before, that due to the internet, there is no need to ever film a “Porky’s” ever again. Horny 14-year-olds have other outlets nowadays. Which you would think would play in any director or producer’s hands, that there is no commercial need to show smut ever again. Nudity that’s organic and contextual, sure. William Gibson, I think, said that sex happens, so you have to write about it, but he’s still very tentative with it. He sets up the characters to evolve a credible relationship, until they first kiss, and then fade to black. The story resumes with them as a couple the next morning or whenever, without any need to tediously go over the nuts and bolts of the mechanism of sex. The attraction, the magic between the characters, that’s the interesting part.
due to the internet, there is no need to ever film a “Porky’s” ever againDon’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of hot and cold running internet porn, but as a guy who came of age in the Porky’s/Fast Times At Ridgemont High era, I do feel a bit sad for boys today who never get to have that almost innocent indoctrination into the world of smut. I still remember the first time I saw a Playboy, watching scrambled cable hoping to see a clear glimpse of boob on Skinemax, etc. The first actual X-rated movie I ever saw was Taboo IV which a couple I was babysitting for had on an unlabeled VHS tape, that was certainly an eye-opener! Now tweens and teens can simply hop on PornHub and see hardcore stuff that would have blown my mind at their age.
Oh, completely. My older sister used to, when my parents weren’t around, rummage around in their stuff and in the closets. One day, she found my father’s meager collection of Playboys and ‘Oui’ magazine, and showed them to me. I was thunderstruck, gobsmacked. I was six years old or thereabouts, didn’t really know what I was looking at, what was happening, but I knew I liked it. The scrambled porn scene in “American Pie”, we’ve all been there. Kids today don’t know how easy they have it. And yes, we’d sit through dreck like “Porky’s” or worse on the hope, or better yet, word-of-mouth or legitimate reviews with reports of confirmed sightings of boobs.
We park our cars in the same garage.
At six-years old, the stuff that made me tingly in my naughty parts was Linda Carter in Wonder Woman, Julie Newmar and Yvonne Craig in Batman, and the various female conquests of Captain James T. Kirk and Buck Rogers in their shows, though it would be years before I understood those feelings.
Perhaps apocryphally, Einstein is said to have never memorized his own phone number. “Why remember something you can look up,” he’d argue, that your brain shouldn’t be filled with extraneous minutiae. You should keep it clear, focused on more weighty matters.The fact that I can’t remember someone who I was introduced to five minutes earlier at a party, but have Princess Ardala and Colonel Wilma Deering burned into my brain pretty much explains the arc of my life.
Remember the legend of that Lynda Carter movie in which she was reputed to show her boobs? We all knew the rumour, but figured there was no way that was true, the Lord wouldn’t ever be so kind to us snotty pre-teens. There were a couple of cranks who swore up and down that it was true, that they’d read about it in the newspaper, but who are you going to believe, your classmate or your common sense that a major Hollywood and TV star would not ever bare her breasts for a sex scene? There are so many ways in which punk-ass Millennials are loathsome, and one of them is that they get to look up stuff to verify shit, on the spot, rather than have raging arguments that devolve into ‘The A-Team’ lunchbox fights. Imagine the wizardly power at that age/Age, to whip out your phone and exclaim “She did TOO!…” You could not only confirm the existence of the movie, but also play the actual sainted scenes. You would be a god.
Oh, yeah…that’s the stuff.If I hadn’t already hit puberty by the time I saw that scene with a deliciously damp Diaz, I’m sure that would’ve done the trick.
I fucking cringe any time i read a detailed sex scene in a novel or story. It just always seems so awkward and unnecessary, and always makes me think that the author themself was just really horny at the time or something. Because otherwise, what’s the point? Is anybody actually turned on by reading sex scenes? They just make me feel awkward reading them.(Edit: remembers 50 Shades and romance novels, feels dumb)
Before I had internet, I used to watch “Pants Off Dance Off” on MTV (VH1?), even though the blurring when they take their clothes off often covered more than their clothes did.Strangely, there’s still something more titillating for me about seeing nudity on non-pay TV.
watch “Pants Off Dance Off” on MTV (VH1?)
You just made that up, for sure. Nice try at getting one over on the French noble.
Author said it in the review…best part of the movie was the oral.
I watched 1993’s Mirror Images II the other day, because Shannon Whirry plays sexy twins, a good twin and an evil twin, both of whom get naked a lot. It’s your standard 1993 DTV smut story. There was a time when I would’ve considered this very much worth my while.I’m not going to say that the sight of a naked Shannon Whirry is in any way unpleasant. But I felt like an absolute moron watching this movie.
There’s always room for Gaspar Noe.
Wow I’ve not read so many sick burns since Vince Canby’s review of “Heaven’s Gate.” Nicely done sir!
The greatest AV Film burn of all time I think belongs to Ignatiy:
https://film.avclub.com/love-is-another-visually-striking-trip-up-director-gasp-1798185425?_ga=2.4404666.883380808.1558614249-1014803903.1524155847
That was an excellent review.
That is pretty terrific. I’ll have to dig through some of Rabin’s old reviews. He had more than a few humdingers.
LOL.
I thought of that movie (and review) reading this one!
You have the right guy, but the wrong movie. I will never forget this review: https://film.avclub.com/contract-to-kill-isn-t-just-bad-it-s-steven-seagal-bad-1798189772“Overall, he gives the kind of performance traditionally associated with stars who died during filming.”
IV’s London Has Fallen review is pretty great, also. He really can eviscerate a movie. Opening line: “Go back to Fuckheadistan,” growls Neanderthal Secret Service agent Mike Banning (Gerard Butler) as he knifes a faceless goon about halfway through the grab bag of dog-whistles and dog-shit filmmaking that is London Has Fallen.
https://film.avclub.com/gerard-butler-scowls-his-way-through-the-atrocious-lond-1798186887
Like, how can you be so down on the human experience, A.A. Dowd? Do you even remember how to make love? Maybe Kechiche just had something to say in words that can’t be contained within the soulful bounds of like, grammatical expression? Maybe we are heading towards the end of everything! Did you consider? Did you even consider?!Maybe Fatalism is the feudalism of the soul. Perhaps we’re all growing potatoes for the nobility in a land devoid of meaning and reason. I BLAME SOCIETY!
Given your name and icon I can only assume that you’re Thundercracker, specifically the one from the IDW comics who writes terrible screenplays.
Lol the internet sucks but is also good sometimes look at this
Woah, that’s exactly what I was thinking as I scrolled down, then read your comment.
Won’t he PLEASE think of the human experience? As it relates to hot, young jiggling asses?Speaking of which the latest issue of my favorite magazine is here…
Whither AV Club memes of yore?EDIT: didn’t scroll far enough, @natureslayer representing.
It’s still cromulent!
“Maybe Fatalism is the feudalism of the soul.”Hahaha. How and why did you come up with this?
You put a lot of time into this comment, and I respect that
Or maybe he’s just a horny creep.Could go either way. Good people on both sides and all that.
Something about teenagers and jiggling asses makes me think they don’t know anything about making love either. Do you remember sex as a teenager? It was amazing only in that you 100% didn’t have to worry about pleasing a woman, and thus were not ever actually making love.You grow up for a reason. But also, you should write pokemon fan fic about the faux socialist economy run by strongmen (gym leaders).
I’m not smart enough to understand your comment, but I like it. And I felt like it was gonna end with:“I wanna dance!”
That’s bullshit. You’re just another suburban punk like me.
I BLAME SOCIETY!I ACCUSE MY PARENTS!
WERE THEY EVEN LISTENING?!
Instant up-vote for the MST3K reference. “Mirror mirror on the wall…can I make it to last call?”
You’re neither subtle, clever or funny.
Joke’s on you, Gerk McJerk. My mom says I’m the most handsome guy in the world.
I BLAME SOCIETY!
It’s a fair cop, we’ll have them, too.
It’s true, then…the billman ALWAYS comes due!
Sweet Christ, I hope you are joking.
Your student film is called “Potatoes for Nobility,” isn’t it?
It’s the perennial cycle of male French filmmakers — one of them emerges from his ass to make a good movie, and another enters to make a terrible one.
Angry Dowd might be my favorite Dowd. I assume that’s what both “A’s” stand for.
Annoyed Angry Dowd?Absolutely Angry Dowd?Aggravated Aggrieved Dowd?The possibilities are endless!
I think you mean Ændless
Aaron Aaronson?
You’re off the chain!
A-Aron Dowd? That troublemaker who is always getting kicked out of Mr. Garvey’s class?
‘Blue is the Warmest Color’ showed some true filmmaking craft and empathy. It also made the biggest blunder I can recall in recent memory. The film is a sensual and slow examination of these two women, down to how they eat, flirt, and discover each other. So when it comes time for our main character Adele’s first lesbian experience, I expected to see the anxiety, fear and anticipation of her first encounter. But nope, we cut straight to the fucking! And she’s fucking this woman like a porn star with years of experience!By glossing over the most important part of her story, Kechiche pretty much exposed his motivation and sunk the whole film for me. It never recovered after that colossal mistake. Watch ‘Bound’ or ‘The Handmaiden’ to see how lesbian sexual discovery on film should be done.
You’re so right on. But isn’t that true for every sex scene in a movie? Everyone is doing crazy porn stunts on the go. Women climax after two minutes, men do acrobatic stunts. I’m convinced we’re all living out the false expectation of being the best at the first go.
True but this movie was building to something special between these two. It was affording it the time to show what young love looks like. Worst movie sex cliche: fucking against a wall. Ouch for her, and does the man’s dick bend that far up?
I agree that’s it’s a bad cliche but the mechanics of wall see are pretty much the same as bed sex although holding the other person up makes thrusting more difficult.
Haven’t seen the movie, but based on what you say, that makes it tragic. We need realistic movies about love and sex because we all know how much fake shit is out there. It’s not harmless either. The amalgamation of all those fake representations produces very real expectations in the average individual.
It seriously goes from realism to porn in one cut. I couldn’t believe it.
I stopped the movie about five minutes after the sex. Everything up to it was wonderful, afterward I was no longer sure what the hell I was watching.
Yes! This describes the entire problem in a nutshell. It’s not that an explicit sex scene was somehow a bridge too far in that film; in fact, it could and should have been cathartic for at least one of the characters.No, the problem is the way in which it was filmed: The film’s established visual look before and after that scene was one of beautifully-shot realism. The sex scene on the other hand was a harshly key-lit production on an obvious soundstage. It looked nothing like the rest of the film, and the directing of that scene was criminally amateurish.
haha, memories of the first and only time i tried it… “maybe we should just move to the bed?” “yeah, yeah, let’s do that….”
Um, you can absolutely fuck against a wall.It’s breathtaking, I suggest you try it.
Wait… what? Are you saying that you dont think people actually use that position in real life?
Sex in a pool for another! It’s really uncomfortable and hard to gain traction. And in a car, as most cars do not have spacious fronts, nor are the backseats ever spacious enough for comfort (that’s what she said).
It’s not that wall-fucking feels good it’s that they are so compelled to fuck that they he will continually push her backwards until he hits something. In the 70s there were experiments about tethering two about-to-fuck movie couples together in parallel but opposite directions to create an electricity-generating turbine but it never reached market penetration.
It doesn’t need to bend up, but unless your partner is the same height, she’s going to need a footstool for both genitalia to be in the right position. If she’s shorter than you, you’ll have to put her on a footstool, and you still have to worry about cramping up in your ass because fucking vertically forces you to use muscles in your legs that aren’t rarely used.. You’ll also need non-slip shoes because your feet will be constantly sliding backwards, so don’t fuck her against the wall wearing socks.You also don’t want to fuck in the shower either; bathroom tiles are ice cold.
And that’s a failure of all the unimaginative cowards who make most of the movies we see today.
As the OP said, Bound manages to be hot and explicit, but doesn’t feel pornographic. Of course, the Wachowskis brought in a lesbian as a technical advisor to make sure it was accurate and not exploitative, because they actually cared about that, whereas the Blue… director seemed to care only about his boner.
Wait, what?!? The first girlfriend I had sex with didn’t come with me after only 2 minutes of me saying I loved her so much? But she said it was so good the next morning when I woke up rolled up in the sheets and she said she had to strip down the pillows to stay warm.Hollywood lies.
True, but in this particular case, the whole heart of the movie seems to be in its super-realistic details, from the slow, believably awkward first conversations to the way they eat with their mouths open and the way they get all snotty when they cry. And then they have sex and all the sudden you’re watching a Vivid Video from the late-90s. The whiplash is extreme. I remember my girlfriend laughing out loud at the sex scene when we watched it.
It felt like scenes had been cut. Haven’t heard a VV shoutout in ages. Brings back memories of the time in my life when I wasn’t having sex. Hmm what’s the opposite of nostalgia?
Your comment reads like the back of a classic VHS porno box. +1.
“Come for the sensual, slow examination of these two women. Stay for the fucking!” —high minded film critic
It’s a win-win?
I’d prefer the examination part of the movie, but I’m one of those weirdos that preferred the more philosophical side of things like The Bloody Death Of The Foul Prince Romero And His Enormous-Bosomed Wife.
But enough about Courtney Trouble.
“I watched it for the dialog”
*The Secret of the Grain* was the first movie of his I saw, and it was incredible, save for a bellydancing thing that was too long and kinda uncomfortable (like skeevy uncomfortable, not “this is supposed to show how this would be in real life” uncomfortable) after a while. Turns out the bellydancing had been significantly cut, and you could see the entire scene with a ridiculously unnecessary length as an extra on the Criterion version. And that gets amplified on *Blue is the Warmest Color*, which starts great by giving you the impression that it’s going to analyze the difficulties of a relationship that crosses social classes (spaghetti slurping vs. pretentious dinner talk, for instance) when there is a relatively smaller pool to date in, but then turns, like you said, into frantic lesbian porn and after that just turns into a kitschy “but the sex was so good” movie.Tl;dr Kechiche is a very talented director, but he’s clearly more interested in looking for excuses to film porn, which is weird, because it’s not like porn isn’t really available in today’s world.
He should have just made porn. Probably much cheaper than having to sell your Palme D’Or. I think I just gave him the idea for his next movie. About a famous director who directs porn to finance his three-hour twerking epic to take to Cannes. Mektoub, My Love: Bang Bus.
Maybe he wants to film porn but also win awards and get paid a living wage?
Sure, that sounds as plausible a theory as any. I just think he’s actually a skeevy dude on top of that.
Re: the bellydancing scene in Against The Grain. Interesting that you conflate “erotic” and “uncomfortable.”
Look, if you disagree with me and think that the bellydance scene is merely “erotic” and not “kinda uncomfortable” within the context of the entire movie – especially given the related extra featurette on the Criterion version, that’s perfectly fine. But please do spare me this “oH, sO YoU cONfLaTe X aND Y. IntEReStiNg. I aM sO sMaRt” shtick. I get that the gist of the scene has its purpose (hence my “too long” comment) and I’m not a prude in the least bit, but yes, just like the porn scene in *Blue Is the Warmest Color*, the bellydancing scene in *The Secret of the Grain* becomes kinda uncomfortable at one point.
You say it becomes “uncomfortable” like it’s an objective fact. There’s a tremendous amount of eroticism, and part of that eroticism is that it feels like it could spin out of control at any moment, although it never does. Perhaps you feel uncomfortable with a woman owning her sexuality, as the belly dancer does.
Awwwww, you’re going all “facts don’t care about your feelings” on me. How adorable.Do I have to precede every single statement with “I think,” “it’s my impression that,” “I believe” or something to that effect for you to understand that I’m stating my opinion? Is that not sufficiently clear from both the medium through which we’re communicating and the fact that I *literally* told you it was fine if you disagreed with me? Are you failing to see the irony of accusing me of saying things as though they were objective when you describe your own impression of the scene and its “eroticism” in the same manner?Here’s the thing, cupcake: We disagree on a scene from one single film (which I think is an amazing film to boot, as I already mentioned) made in 2007. The only difference is that I know that, in the grand scheme of things, that’s ultimately as unimportant as disagreeing on… I dunno… whether “The Color of Pomegranates” is a great movie or not. You, on the other hand, have decided to take this opportunity to play armchair psychologist and attempt to impugn my views on sexuality (on which you are way off, I might add) and accuse me of being unable to distinguish opinion from objective fact. Ceci n’est pas it, chief.
I guess being condescending is supposed to infuriate me so much that I lose my shit and write a 20 page response, which I just realized is what I did to you. How sad.
And yet you somehow felt the need to respond again. Funny how that works.See ya.
lol
Thank you, I could never quite articulate why that first sex scene bothered me so much – mainly because I thought the movie was okay and haven’t spent much time in the past 6 years thinking about it.
I watched the movie years after the fact, and I couldn’t believe there was even an argument about whether the sex scenes were exploitative. Its pure male-gaze porn, and as a dude I thought it was hot, but it was pretty obvious it was about the director getting off, not the characters. And most lesbians seem to feel it is closer to lesbian porn for straight males than any kind of actual lesbian experience. Also, my wife watched the movie and then read the comic, and she said that most of the changes seemed to sensationalize and add melodrama to the material that wasn’t there originally (plus there is no extended explicit sex in the comic). She liked the movie, but her opinion was lowered after reading the source material.
If read interviews with the Lea and Adele about how that scene was filmed Kechiche probably had 60 hours or more of reel to edit that scene together from so it seems he made it as pornish as he could. You’d also find that Kechiche is a manipulative, abusive, exploitive asshole. He forced them to shoot that scene all day for ten fucking days straight. It wasn’t anything like a typical shoot for a sex scene either. There were a bunch of people on set watching and even commenting. There was no effort to make the actors feel comfortable Kechiche doesn’t give proper direction outside of snide remarks or fits of rage where he yells things to the effect of, “you’re just not getting it!” Adele, who was barely 19, got cast over coffee with Kechiche. He made clear there was going to be some sex scenes and she was fine with that, she had done one in her first film, but she was not expecting anything like what happened. She said people wouldn’t even dare to say and ask things of actors that Kechiche did. There’s a reason they said they felt prostituted and would never work with him again. Lea made it more explicit saying she’s an actor and doesn’t, and won’t, have actual sex on screen, implying that’s what he was looking for. Both actors have also said Kechiche never knew what he wanted from a scene, so really didn’t direct them, and instead just shot the same scene over and over endlessly. Literally sometimes over 100 takes for 10 seconds of actual screen time. That’s how an agreed upon 3 month shoot ballooned into 5 and a half months. If I remember correctly it was Lea who called out how contracts work in the French film industry, saying they make you a “slave” to the director and there’s no recourse if the director demands things beyond what were stated initially, or if the director is simply being abusive and unreasonable. Adele actually said they’d be in jail if they shot this in the US because of things that happened on set. Obviously there’s some hyperbole there, but when the lead actors in a film that wins Cannes’ highest honor say they’d never work with the director again during promotional press tours, then you know that working with that director is beyond horrible.
… The Handmaiden is the porniest, male-gaze-iest lesbian sex I’ve ever had the misfortune of seeing in the cinema. And it sucked especially hard because I saw it with my girlfriend at the time. We were both cringing.
Blue is the Warmest Color is one of the most offensive movie I’ve ever seen in my life. He took a simple tragic romance story by a lesbian for lesbians, and made it into pretentious wank material for straight men. The porn-like sex scene, the addition of Adèle first having sex with a boy instead of Emma, the scene of men discussing how the female orgasm is so much more sacred an experience than the male orgasm, the removal of Adèle’s dad’s homophobia, and the almost complete removal of Adèle’s gay best friend, all of the creative decision he made were to make the film more palatable to straight men. It’s fucking disgusting. I hate this movie with a passion of a thousand suns.
Plus one for the Larry Clark reference. Sounds like more of a Roy Moore vibe though.
…and it was a sequel!
Now, I ask you good people, wasn’t this movie just crying out for an ‘Electric Boogaloo’?
Or a 2 Adjective 2 Adjective?
I’m imagining what it would be like if this Intermezzo were the model for more middle installments of trilogies…
Episode 5, but just a bunch of Twi’leks at Jabba’s palace
Godfather II, but just Fredo’s cocktail waitresses out in Vegas
So its the visual version of the Blue is the Warmest Color’s auditory experience? AKA 3 hours of nonstop open mouth sounds.
I remember talking to a business colleague in Caen, France. He said that every year come May the town gets at least one clueless tourist who asks where the film festival is.“Can you tell me where the film festival is?”“Uhm, about 1,000km that way”Cutting out about 10 minutes of fussing with Google Translate of course.
“It’s the end of everything!” Hasn’t that pretty much been you whingy bitches’ refrain since what, Nov 9 2016?
+4 more years
“…the film is a slog of epic proportions, its trancelike repetitiveness threatening to destroy this critic’s fragile grasp on time itself, ushering me into a new plane of starchild boredom.” What a goddamn masterpiece of a sentence.
I love reviews of shitty movies almost more than movies themselves at this point.
Yes, there were several great sentences or passages that made me stop to re-read them.Kechiche actually sold his own Palme to pay for the completion of the original Mektoub (did he sweeten the deal by throwing in his craft and good sense, too?), which producers pulled financing on during post-production, in what I can only see as proof that sometimes the system does work.
Great line(s).
This may be my favorite Dowd review since The Space Between Us.
He sold his own Palme for this train wreck. That’s some desperation there. If your backers pull out (lol!!!) and you have to start selling prized possessions, maybe, just maybe, you need to reconsider the direction your film is taking. I’m also of the mind that the nominators/whoever they are at Cannes purposefully include a couple WTF films by serious directors they have previously honored because they are dicks and like the public humiliation. OTOH, it really does seem like this film deserved it. Made two years ago, never getting a US release? Better hope for a third part to your so called trilogy so you can recover and get that BAFTA and Oscar in the same year…and maybe the Palme.Again.
Nah, I’m pretty sure all movies in the main comp are either there because of either (1) perceived quality, (2) star power, or (3) track record of the director (as Dowd says, if your’re in, you’re in). As previous Palm d’Or winner, a new Kechiche is pretty much a lock, so point (3) is already satisfied. Moreover, certain (French) critics did, in fact, like the film, so it’s not inconceivable that the programmers like it, too.
My question again, though, is that if this was a great film, why was it shelved for two years? Editing? Because it seems like that was lacking there. Funding? Well, he did sell that Palme, so I guess he figured it out. Distribution? I’m going with that, because if your film sits on the shelf for two years, it seems like all the houses he talked to saw it and walked out until he found someone to take the bait (and take a chance).I may be entirely wrong.
Just to be clear: I was talking about the selection of Mektoub part 2. Given that Kechiche is an established name, its selection was kind of guarenteed. They even gave it a premiere at the end of the festival to allow for additional editing time.w/r/t the release of Mektoub part 1: it premiered in Venice to mixed reactions, and did subsequently get a theatrical release in quite a few markets, just not in the U.S. Many non-U.S. films never secure U.S. distribution, but I don’t no the exact reason why this didn’t.
“numbed our asses (and minds) with nothing but ass.”nuAVClub
x
These Cannes reviews were quite refreshing. Film criticism that concentrated mostly on the artistic merits of the films, not how well the movies lined up with the reviewer’s politics of the moment.
Dowd and Iggy are pretty good at separating church and state in their reviews.Katie Rife finds it impossible, however.
Horn rimmed glasses will do that to you.
For an extreme example without a shed of self-awareness, try reading Inkoo Kang over on Slate.
We could all use a shed of self-awareness.
You’re pretty dense if you can’t find the politics in the reviews by the two men you’re praising
But Hasselt, all art is political and about whatever pet issue I’m obsessed with at the moment.
At risk of starting a flame war… almost everything is political. Politics is, at its core, nothing more than the economics of power. Any time there’s an interaction between people where there’s any power imbalance, there’s a political aspect to it.
I can say from personal experience that it’s nice to be in the groups (straights, whites, males) which have more power than anyone else, and one of the privileges of being in those groups is that I can usually ignore the political implications of media, because nobody has the power to oppress the groups I’m in. When someone analyzes media from the perspective of someone who’s in an oppressed group, if I say “you shouldn’t politicize this” then I’m trying to reinforce the power imbalance by shutting down the conversation about it.A critic who focuses too much on the politics of media may not give you what you want, which is to know whether you (as someone who is probably in one or more of the has-the-most-power groups) will enjoy the movie. And there’s definitely valid conversations to be had about whether a critic who is not in a particular oppressed group should be making noise on behalf of that oppressed group (e.g. white people talking about how racism is bad; how about let’s hear from black voices instead).Thoughts?
Everything is political, absolutely, but politics is not the only interpretive framework with which to evaluate art. I would argue that the way political readings are wielded, especially online, they tend to shut down discussions more than other approaches. So I’d say the problem is that politics are used too much in reviews, but that they’re not used well, and generally say more about the reviewer than the work.
If everything is political and politics is just war disguised doesn’t that mean everything is actually war disguised?
That’s a fair approach, I think. As long as we’re careful to distinguish between “this critic’s political approach to the work is crappy” and “critics shouldn’t take political approaches to artwork.”
You can make art about more than just the political structures in society. To think that’s only what art is about such a limiting perspective imo.
I don’t think anyone asserted either of the things you’re saying there.
What does “All art is political” mean?
I don’t know why you’re asking that; I didn’t say that or imply it.
uh ok
It means the person who said it eats, breaths, sleeps, and wallows in the misery of politics every waking moment of their life, and we should too.
It means that all art is political.
Ah, I see your issue: you think art has to be “about the political structures in society” to be political. LOL
Ok so what does it mean
[FARTS]
*strokes chin thoughtfully* Interesting, interesting.
As noted above, I want to know if the movie is any good, not if it clicks all of the reviewers political boxes of the moment. A movie can be political, but if so, I want to know how well it plays the politics, not if the reviewer agrees with every single point being made (or even points that the movie wasn’t trying to make but the reviewer insists on inserting anyway).
Except “is a movie good?” is itself a political statement. Birth of a Nation (1915) is well made in the context of mid-10s American filmmaking, but it’s impossible to separate its use of close-ups, tracking shots, et cetera from Griffith’s attitudes about race, American history and women’s purity. Long Shot might have all sorts of great Seth Rogan stoner jokes, but you can’t disconnect them from its attempt to interrogate feminism or the nature of politics itself. Aladdin (2019) might be intended as a Disney fantasy, but you can’t avoid the fact that an American (an African American) is playing a character derived from Arabian mythologies. To pretend that the relationship between aesthetics and politics (Richard Dyer first wrote about how cinematographic standards assumed white people as objects back in the mid 1980s; it’s an observation that has been revived recently), between humor and the society in which it occurs, between casting (an aesthetic choice) and narrative — to pretend that these are irrelevant is simply to argue that your politics aren’t actually politics but just the way things are. To put it a charitable way: you can’t argue quality by refusing to acknowledge qualities. To put it a less charitable way: your privilege is showing.
All art is political though, LOL
Or who was there, what they were wearing, who’s together..that shit.
Politics and film go hand and hand. Stop crying.
Translation: waaaaaaa I didn’t like the film (too much girls & ass) and I want you to not like it with me!
*psst* criticism is art, too.
You’re not a very careful reader, are you
Oh good, tedious complaining about the politics of reviews even when it’s complimenting this one. You forgot to call the other reviewers SJWs.
Your words, not mine. Have a nice day.
Yeah, how dare a reviewer make judgments based on their own point-of-view?! Unlike this reviewer, who doesn’t do something as political as, just spitballing, saying this film is mostly concerned with ogling its women and that the director himself may be sexist, casting the rest of his oeuvre in an uglier light! Nope, just sticks to “artistic” discussion.
I dunno, but isn’t it an old French tradition to have creepy older men film young attractive people having sex and call it the art of film?
When I saw that it was the same director as Blue is the Warmest Color, I was not that shocked. I’m one of the few people who did not like that movie. I thought it was slow, meddling, exploitative, and full of itself.
that headline is a pure oxymoron.
at least Gaspar Noe keeps it under 2
Not with Love he didn’t.
More ass than City Girls – Twerk by Cardi B?
That is a thing to behold.
OK, but answer me this: Where does it fall on the T&A Spectrum?
Fuckin’ Frenchies
ennui is a yawn
Even though Love: 3D is a Gaspar Noé film, not a Kechiche film, I remember when it came out there was a lot of discussion about what made Blue is the Warmest Color a good film when so many movies that are functionally “a director tells people to have sex for real in front of camera with no plan and no script” are terrible. And I think answer was pretty self evident even when BitWC first came out – it was a small enough story that Léa Seydoux and Adèle Exarchopoulos really could force in the character work. I also think by virtue of it being a graphic novel, they already a visual language to reference without being as dependent on the director’s interpretation.
“Too much ass” is a feature not a bug.
This film is nothing BUT bugs.
I just want to pop a boner looking at 18 year olds club on ecstasy. Stop making me depressed while I do it, filmmakers.
Then actually go to a club where there are 18-year olds on ecstasy.Beats watching it on film, trust me.
And you KNOW the defenders will say “If you didn’t like Mektoub, you didn’t understand Mektoub” (ala“Intersteller” and “The Last Jedi).
‘…giving Girls Gone Wild the grueling slow-cinema treatment’. Here! Take my money!!!!
South Padre, the new film from Terrence Malick.
So do they go family style on that woman in the screencap, or what?
Sounds like the greatest movie since Lambada: The Forbidden Dance
Soooo, this is the real life Medellin?
“Four hours of mindless twerking” can also be used to describe the career of Cardi B.
Or a typical Saturday afternoon at Miley Cyrus’ house.
Nah, she’s out of her ratchet phase.She’s headed back to the Opry.
So basically “Step up 4: en Français”
Nope.
If only. This sounds more like Step Up 4: The Brown Bunny
Every year I’m not sure who gives the greatest performances at Cannes: The actors in the various films, or the critics with their various egos…
Translation: waaaaaaa I didn’t like the film (too much girls & ass) and I want you to not like it with me!
If the scheduling of the movie implies infinite sadism on the part of the schedulers, and the movie gets a D, I would love to know what it would take to get an F.
The Creeping Terror-level total incompetence.
I will not see this movie. However it did lead me to Google Ophélie Bau…and Good God.
She is indeed a handsome woman.
Original French title: Une nuit au Roxbury
Ke-SHEESH this sounds bad!See what I did there.
4 hours or twerking? Shut up and take my money!
Reading that opening paragraph was like watching a 4 hour movie
“A drunken night out rendered in all its horny anti-spendor”-The AV Club!
Even just reading the description of this movie is fucking exhausting. Who the fuck would think this would actually make for an interesting film?
People who do lots and lots of drugs, that’s who.
I dont know… i do lots and lots of drugs, and i think it sounds fucking awful.
In the words of Orson Welles, “Ahhhh, the… French…”
“the nagging feeling that we all may be hurtling toward a point of destructive conclusion.”Jesus, you people need to get over yourselves. We live in the most peaceful, prosperous period in human history. SACK THE FUCK UP, YOU CRYBABIES.
That white girl in the picture needs rescuing, quick.
Thank you @A.A Dowd for another well written, thoughtful and often hilarious coverage of this year’s Festival. Rests my eyes from all the self glitter smearing, coma inducing cahiers du cinema type reviews we usually get in France.
Jesus. I mean, at least Woody Allen’s penchant for perversity was somewhat offset by his having made some of the most iconic films of the twentieth century. This dude just sounds like a porn director that accidentally stumbled into filmmaking.
Allen’s films decrease in iconic status with each passing millisecond.
I can honestly say that if you made a movie about my 20’s, it would be a much more interesting film. Pick any night. And I do not have a high opinion of my 20’s.
Does anyone else feel like this four-hour ass movie is the karmic justice Dowd deserves for hanging all those mediocre grades on perfectly fine mainstream movies?
Not really. “Perfectly fine” practically defines mediocrity.
Is Netflix at Cannes this year?
Yes, represented by Amy Poehler’s landmark feature debut about wine sipping.
Poehler? Mm, pass.Now I’m really stoked to see “Parasite”.
For an interminable three and a half hours, the Tunisian-French director Abdellatif Kechiche numbed our asses (and minds) with nothing but ass: a parade of gyrating, jiggling flesh, belonging to a group of hot but terminally boring French twentysomethings on summer vacationHey, look on the bright side: in less than 500 years, this will be the top movie in America.
It’s a fuckin’ cliche at this point to bring up that movie whenever one is slagging off media they don’t like, but damn if it doesn’t fit here.For an interminable three and a half hours, the Tunisian-French director Abdellatif Kechiche numbed our asses (and minds) with nothing but ass: a parade of gyrating, jiggling flesh, belonging to a group of hot but terminally boring French twentysomethings on summer vacation…“And the number one movie in the country was called Ass. And that’s all it was, for ninety minutes. It won eight Oscars that year, including Best Screenplay.”
After reading that paragraph, it was the one time I’ve ever really felt like Idiocracy was the best analogy out there.
Is this like Nine Songs, where there’s five minutes of total plot, count it as 10 minutes if you’re being generous, and the rest is just concerts and fucking?
Yep. We are just about at full “Idiocracy” — here’s the new version of “Ass”.
I saw the headline and header image and was fully prepared to read a review of a Gasper Noe film. My mistake.
I don’t care what people say, Blue is the Warmest Color was just a godawful bore of a film with probably the most boring protagonist I’ve ever seen in a love story. The only thing I took away from the film was lesbians are just as shitty as the whole “relationship” thing as the straight community, and frankly I didn’t need 3 hours of stinky french sex to glean that chestnut.
No shocker here. French Artists are the masters of guilt-rationalizing porn by stuffing it with stoner-deep pretentiousness.
C’mon French people, just admit you like really like to look at titties and spare us the freshman-art-class bullshit.
Sounds like something that the diabolical and dastardly Gaspar Noé would direct, no?
Maybe they should stop letting dirty kebab and shawerma frying immigrants make movies, or at least not screen it for normal people, at Cannes of all places! Jeez!
Sorry, not sorry, but if you like twerking, you are a trashy human being. you can like butts, they can appeal to you, but twerking is straight trashy.
So, according to the sliding AA Dowd scale, this movie is really a B-.
I get a bad vibe from this director.Like, his only gig is to degrade white women. He seems to find them innately lewd and therefore attractive and repellent. White actresses should give this guy a wide berth.
This description of how Kechiche shot the sex scene sounds similar to the one in Blue is the Warmest Colour, except with even more boundaries crossed:https://twitter.com/cj_prin/status/1132316538604871680?s=21
Stored to movies I’ll Never See and Never Intended on Seeing. Can you do something on the Men in Black reboot? Or Godzilla. There won’t be enough of those.
“As its subtitle suggests, Mektoub, My Love: Intermezzo is technically a sequel…”Mektoub, My Love: Port of Call New Orleans
I head the only dance worth watching at Cannes is And Then We Danced.
So you took the time and effort to review this drivel, but no one at this site could be bothered to review even one episode of “Chernobyl”? Uh huh.