Tag Archives: Personal Shopper

Non-Fiction (2018): Comedy for Literary Intellectuals

Olivier Assayas (Personal Shopper) has made a genre shift with his newest film. Instead of deep dramas, Non-Fiction is a comedy. The film involves four main characters: a book publisher (Guillaume Canet) and his actor wife (Juliette Binoche; Caché) and a writer (Vincent Macaigne) and his wife who works in political campaigns (Nora Hamzawi). Each has their own, often interrelated, mini-crises happening, both personal and professional, and they provide the background to the film’s main focus: conversations between educated and opinionated people.

Compared to Assayas’s recent work, Non-Fiction has surprisingly poor visuals. No one expects a comedy to be visually arresting, but the lackluster images are extremely noticeable since Assayas’s past two films were well shot. Part of the problem may be that his previous two works were shot on 35mm film while Non-Fiction appears to be shot digitally and likely has a lower production budget. Digital cinematography has to potential to be gorgeous but many scenes here suffer from blatant visual flaws. An early lunch scene has noticeable digital noise with blue dots speckled in darker regions of the image. Other scenes are outdoors and are completely blown out. It doesn’t help that the film’s sequences typically revolve around sitting at a table. The many conversations are filmed with very rudimentary shot reverse shots and only the occasional handheld camera circling the cast’s dining table to mix things up. They don’t ruin the film, but the poor lighting and cinematography is often distracting.

Hamzawi’s pragmatism is charming and hilarious.

The comedy can be uninvolving at first, but it grows on you. The jokes are subtle and come fast and furious to the point that they are easily missable, especially early on. Then, because the of the film’s literary focus, the comedy feels insular and pretentious, like a bunch of writers and publishers arguing theory with little practical purpose, but eventually this subsides. As the characters are developed, their histories are exposed and we see the fragility beneath their grand debates. All of the performances are strong, but Hamzawi emerges as the breakout. In contrast to her husband, she is practical, direct, and efficient. When her husband tells her that his book has been rejected by his longtime publisher she responds “What do you want me to do? Cry?” Her blunt responses are hilarious and the fortitude of her character is incredibly endearing. Even the other, more flawed characters have depth that drives their actions and the comedy.

Overall, this is a very French film. The majority of the movie is spent with characters eating, drinking, and, most of all, talking. People debate literature, technology, and several jokes rely on literary or film knowledge. Assayas prevents this from becoming haughty by subtly undercutting potential intellectual superiority. When esoteric references are made, it is implied that the character hasn’t actually read or seen the title they namedrop. Hypocrisy brings these bourgeois people back down to earth. The humor isn’t strikingly original or uproariously funny, but the film keeps maintains a healthy rhythm of laughs and even uses personal failings for brief moments of introspection. It’s a lighter work than his previous films, but Non-Fiction is still an enjoyable comedy for fans of talkative movies.

3/5 stars.

Personal Shopper (2017)

Olivier Assayas’s newest film was surprisingly the most divisive entry at last year’s Cannes Film Festival. After the screening, several critics booed the movie while others applauded. Despite the mixed reaction, most likely in response to the ending, it went on to win the award for Best Director. Personal Shopper is the second team-up between Assayas and Kristen Stewart after 2015’s Clouds of Sils Maria. Stewart plays Maureen, a personal shopper in Paris who happens to be a medium. Her twin brother, also a medium, recently died from a congenital heart disease they both share. They made a promise at a young age that whoever passed away first would give the other a sign from the afterlife so Maureen stays put in a job she hates, waiting for his signal.

Stewart delivers consistently strong acting. Her conflicted expressions display her fragile emotional state. Losing her twin brother was losing a part of herself and that mourning prevents her otherworldly explorations from becoming pretentious or irritating. During her day job buying clothes for her wealthy employer she shows her professional ennui without appearing whiny. Her character’s longing to reconnect with her twin brother and inability to move past with death are deeply sympathetic. Her previous experience working with the director has clearly benefitted her as she completely inhabits the role.

There is a certain amount of unintended silliness to the movie’s premise. It’s very easy for ghost stories to become laughable when attempts to connect with spirits are stilted and Personal Shopper occasionally veers into that territory. Large portions of the film feature Stewart texting the ghost that is supposedly stalking her which isn’t as foreboding as direct contact would have been. There are scenes when this type of communication is used effectively, like turning on your phone to see a series of progressively violent texts, but at times it makes the spectral world seem disappointingly mundane.

Stewart’s fearful attempts to make contact are the best parts of the film.

When Maureen is faced with meeting a ghost in person, the film is able to ratchet up the tension. As she explores an empty house or apartment looking for a signal from a spirit that may or may not be her brother, there is a palpable sense of dread because anything can be mistaken as a sign. Did someone leave that faucet on? Is it the wind that opened this door? Stewart’s performance hypersensitizes the audience to every irregular detail that could potentially be caused by supernatural interference. These scenes create the desired apprehension and show the potential of what the film could have been.

Personal Shopper is help back by its unfocused screenplay. Assayas splits the runtime across the intriguing ghost story and the fairly banal workplace drama. This prevents either aspect from being fully developed and actively harms the tone created in the ghost story. Maureen’s dissatisfaction with the menial tasks the make up her job and the demanding, inconsiderate diva she works for is relatable but consumes unnecessary screen time. Had Assayas been more decisive with his focus, he could have either made a compelling exploration of the afterlife or an interesting drama about a stifling dead-end job. Without a clear direction, Personal Shopper can’t succeed beyond Stewart’s committed performance.

3/5 stars.