Criterion Challenge # 19Cinema has shown an image of a woman from a male perspective that is completely fake. And even when they try to show a woman’s life, they portray a fantasized daily life - Chantal Akerman
I finished this yesterday, but I was really affected by this and decided to sleep on my review. Jeanne is forced into absolute order. For 200 minutes she cooks, cleans, eats, has sex, and goes to bed, then when the next day comes she does it all over again. He is oppressed into her routine, as a representation of the deep seated oppression woman had always been experiencing. I think also the fact that throughout this whole movie Jeanne isn't sexualized at all. You see her nude, and you see her partaking in sex work, but the actual character is never sexualized. I think this acts like a genius "f you" to male directors at this time that would do this at a constant. The ending is a revolt to this oppression she has been trapped in for years. She pulls back the reigns and turns her constructed order into a messy regain of agency.
I like to think that I have a higher attention span, but still slow cinema always seems like a challenge. Like I'm going to be tormented just for watching something and this is never the case. Not to come of pretentious, but in my current state of film affairs I think the average slow cinema film is way more entertaining than a Marvel movie. Even this being said this scared me deeply, just because I didn't know how I would feel about it. I judge my movie ratings equally on importance and enjoyment, and I would rather just not watch this than come of incredibly dumb for giving this a 2. My fear was even deeper set when several of my friends told me that you shouldn't watch it in one sitting or without music. Now that I've seen the movie I can truly say that theres hypnotizing element to this film. Everything she was doing had me entirely engrossed, and I think that's because I wasn't expecting anything, this movie just is. It's not grueling, it's not boring, it's not fun. It just is, and those are always the best types of films.