8/28/2023 0 Comments Julia ducournau lesbianJulia Ducournau, Main Slate, 2021, France, 108 minutes.įor the first half-hour or so of writer-director Julia Ducournau’s Palme d’Or winner I thought Spike’s jury was right and I was watching the movie of the year. (Get you a director who can do both.) The knowingly naughty Benedetta completes a post-Hollywood trilogy of brilliant provocations from the fearless 83-year-old filmmaker, as Verhoeven’s 2006 Holocaust fuckfest Black Book and his 2016 “rape comedy” Elle mine similarly outrageous entertainments out of subjects that are no laughing matter. Like a lot of Verhoeven movies, Benedetta is a sophisticated exploration of institutional power imbalances and systemic structural oppression that plays just as well with intellectual pointy-heads as the crowd who came to see some titties and gore. Soon she’s manipulating her way up through the church hierarchy, while secretly having a lurid lesbian affair with her cellmate Sister Bartolomea (Daphné Patakia) as the plague makes its way to the region. (It was also raining, and the devout don’t like to get their signs wet.) This appallingly enjoyable nunsploitation epic stars Virginie Efira as a 17th century sister struck with stigmata after being rocked by visions of a sexy Jesus. A pal noted that people picketing a new Verhoeven movie was the best kind of ‘90s nostalgia, but alas, any religious fervor in the streets had subsided by the time I arrived in town for Tuesday night’s screening. Returning to the New York Film Festival for a third time following Kevin Smith’s Dogma in 1999 and Jean-Luc Godard’s Hail Mary back in 1985, a small crowd of Catholic protestors stood angrily outside Alice Tully Hall during the Sunday afternoon premiere of Paul Verhoeven’s feverishly blasphemous Benedetta. Paul Verhoeven, Main Slate, 2021, France/Netherlands, 121 minutes. My first dispatch from the 59th New York Film Festival includes capsule reviews of Paul Verhoeven’s Benedetta, Julia Ducournau’s Titane and Ed Lachman’s Songs For Drella.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |