Director Claire Denis’ hardcore cinematic oeuvre is, set against the season of eye candy, the celluloid equivalent of dietary fibre. Wait. Come back. True, the sugar highs and car-chases are few and far between but you’ll feel much, much better afterwards and you might even dislodge the last residual traces of ‘teen comedy sensation’ Fired Up.
Witness an early scene in 35 Shots Of Rum when the central relationship between father Lionel (Descas) and daughter Josephine (Diop) is revealed through lingering portraits of household appliances. A happily functioning family unit, the pair’s domestic rhythms form an easy two-step around the rice-maker, the washing machine, the stereo.
Fans will recognise the beats – rain in anonymous Parisian streets, pregnant pillow shots – and the slow burn. There are no wild upheavals here, only a poignant study of a daddy and grown up daughter getting ready to say goodbye. A film of tiny delicate motions, the most dramatic occurrences – an overlooked lover smoking on a balcony, Lionel’s realisation that Josephine is in love with the dashing, well-travelled Noe (Colin) – are conveyed as momentary looks.
For all the minimalism, there are strange undercurrents at work. A particularly zen subplot involving the repeated rejections felt by Lionel’s girlfriend, Gabrielle (Dogue), deserves a film of its own. And what of the drunken old German relative who may have wandered in from a Fassbender flick?
Breathing and moving in its own sweet time, like the rattling suburban trains Lionel drives for a living, this is the best Claire Denis film in ages.