moviereview - I Loved You So Long

I'VE LOVED YOU SO LONG

	Novelist Philippe Claudel's redemptive drama about sisters who learn to love one another after a fifteen year absence.	score 4	moviereview rates films from 1 (unwatchable) to 5 (unmissable)
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Cast
Kristin Scott Thomas, Elsa Zylberstein, Serge Hazanavicius, Laurent Grévil

Director
Philippe Claudel

Screenwriter
Phiippe Claudel

Country
France (subtitles)

Rating / Running Time
M / 115 minutes

Australian Release
December 2008

Official Site

Philippe Claudel’s absorbing drama opens quietly in a French station where a Juliette (Kristin Scott Thomas) is waiting unhappily. Her face tells a story of heartache, if only we could read it. Another woman, Léa (Elsa Zylberstein), arrives late but their association is not clear: daughter, friend, colleague? It’s the first of many, many questions left hanging that serve to reel audiences deep inside the trappings of an awkward, sometimes devastating relationship.

They drive to Léa’s family home; her husband is unwelcoming but their adopted daughter is delighted and becomes the first to start cracking Aunt Juliette’s hardened shell. Yet questions remain and are asked by many – why is Juliette so elusive, such a stranger? Where has she been hidden for fifteen years, and why? Everyone, it seems, has suspicions.

That Claudel is able to shield his cards so well and play them so carefully, is one of the film’s great strengths. His willingness to allow Scott Thomas long passages of silence is another. She turns chain-smoking and the distant stare into something so gripping, so evocative, that Oscar is already buzzing. Claudel’s bold use of a soft, unflattering palette only heightens this experience.

Yet I've Loved You So Long is more than performance. It’s a heartfelt study of family dynamics and the fragile strength of human spirit. As details of Juliette’s absence unfold between narrative bombshells, a profoundly touching story emerges. It’s all the more remarkable since Juliette’s behaviour (prior or present) offers few reasons to like her. It is Léa’s offered hand that lifts our heart, and the film, from the clutches of despair.

// COLIN FRASER