Wednesday 29 March 2017

Film: 'Certain Women'

An enigmatic film which is sure to exasperate those who dislike loose ends. This is a compendium of three disparate stories  - or, rather, slices of stories, since they are joined without their backgrounds having been established and all are left hanging in the air. I don't have much problem with this kind of film though I was close to asking "What was the point?"

Based on stories by a Maile Meloy (no, me neither) they are a trio of tales all set in Montana shown successively, with connections so tenuous they might as well have been non-existent, each story being around half an hour long. Then at the film's end there's a further scene from each, which barely takes any of them further at all.

First, a lawyer (Laura Dern) is acting for an irascible employee (Jared Harris) who is seeking compensation and whose dissatisfaction with developments causes him to take extreme action. (It sounds more interesting than it was.) 
The second story involves Michelle Williams (with husband James Le Gros) trying to buy a pile of sandstone from an elderly man living alone in an isolated bungalow. 
Finally, and potentially the most interesting of the three, a single woman (Lily Gladstone) who owns stables for four horses accidentally drops into an adult evening class in politics where she becomes more interested in the reluctant tutor (Kristen Stewart) than in the actual subject. 

Director, Kelly Reichardt, who also wrote the screenplay, makes no real attempt to weave the stories together, which is fair enough, though it makes those very slim connections seem imposed from outside to show some kind of token cohesion. It wasn't really necessary.

Watching the film was a fair enough experience, I suppose. I think what kept me from being bored was the expectation in each of the tales that something very significant was about to happen - which didn't. Not an obligatory watch, though neither would I class it as being 'bad'...........6.

8 comments:

  1. I read a similar review on this a while back

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    1. It's an oddity of a film, J.G. Wasn't quite sure what they wanted to achieve other than whiling away 100 minutes which, I must admit, wasn't without a bit of interest.

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  2. I think I would find this hard to follow.

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    1. I think it's one of those films you just allow to play, Sol, without attempting to stay with it. If you do drift off you won't have missed that much.

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  3. Michelle Williams, for me, would make it a must-see.

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    1. Actually, Bob, her segment is where the female element is less prominent than in the other two parts, her husband having about as much screen time as she does. Having said that, if you really are a fan of hers then you might well find it had been worth searching out.

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  4. Thanks fir the warning Ray. I'll take a pass. Sound like another "Twin Peaks" scam.

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    1. I'll take your word re 'Twin Peaks', Ron. It's one of my great regrets that I've never seen, it having been broadcast when I lived in Germany and has not been re-broadcast on terrestrial channels since then.
      But you won't be missing that much by not seeing 'Certain Women' which I'd rate as just a bit better than being a time-filler.

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