One film that polarized audiences, but even got those that didn’t like it to talk about it, was Leos Carax‘s Holy Motors, a film meant to be seen in the midst of movie lovers where they can argue over its content as soon as they walk out of the theater and over the course of the following days.
In my review, I opened saying, “What the hell did I just watch? This was my first reaction to Leos Carax’s Holy Motors, a movie that is not so much a movie as it is a collection of ideas, visuals and themes all in an effort to present a commentary on the current state of filmmaking… I think.”
This is a film that will likely be shown in film studies classes as each and every scene is open to interpretation and it has now been picked up by the Indomina Group for U.S. distribution. Here’s the synopsis:
We follow 24 hours in the life of a being (Denis Lavant) moving from life to life like a cold and solitary assassin moving from hit to hit. In each of these interwoven lives, the being possesses an entirely distinct identity: sometimes a man, sometimes a woman, sometimes youthful, sometimes old to the point of dying; sometimes destitute, sometimes wealthy. By turns murderer, beggar, company chairman, monstrous creature, worker, family man…
It’s clear that Denis Lavant is playing roles, and plunging headfirst into each – but where are the cameras, the crew, the director? He seems horribly alone, exhausted from being chained to all these lives that are not his, from having to kill enemies that are not his enemies, having to embrace wives and children who are not his. But sometimes, conversely, we feel Denis Lavant is wounded by having to leave, the moment his scene is over, other beings he would have liked to leave no longer.
Where is his home, his family, his rest?
The film is the favorite at the moment to win the Cannes Film Festival Palme d’Or, which will be announced shortly and will certainly give it something to help boost its prospects stateside, but this isn’t a film that will be watched by the masses as much as it will excite cinephiles everywhere.
You can read my full review right here and I’ve included the trailer below and you can watch a second clip right here.
