Clouds of Sils Maria stars Juliette Binoche as an internationally famous actor who allows herself to be persuaded to appear in a beloved friend’s play, but not in her original role as the young seducer, which was the role that catapulted her into stardom, but as the older woman. She has to immerse herself in the past and explore her discomfort in the shift while her personal assistant, played by Kristen Stewart, acts as her translator with the contemporary world and the actor who will take her former role, who is played by Chloe Grace Moretz.
A friend recommended Clouds of Sils Maria after I saw Personal Shopper and was not too enthusiastic about it. At the time, I did not think that I was familiar with Olivier Assayas’ films, but I am familiar with a couple of them: Demonlover, which I vaguely remember finding disturbing and haunting in a good way, and Summer Hours, which I unequivocally loved. I am familiar with Assayas’ films, but I do not recognize his past and present self as the same person because I missed the transition when he stopped making me feel anything.
The director of Clouds of Sils Maria and Personal Shopper is clearly the same person, but the same director as Demonlover and/or Summer Hours? Absolutely not, it feels as if different people directed these films, and I am not as into this incarnation. This Assayas gives me a glimpse into a foreign world that I am interested in, but his focus is less restrained than so stylized in his determination to create a portrait of a single person or a phenomenon that it becomes remote, and he eventually forgets to bring me along. It feels as if he is making films for some elusive purpose or for a specific person. In this case, Binoche, which means that he had me for eighty-nine minutes of the two-hour four-minute runtime, but the last thirty-five minutes felt like a chore.
I actually tried to see Clouds of Sils Maria twice, but the first time was after a day that broke me down like a hungry, tired toddler so I did not blame the movie for putting me to sleep. Two weeks later under dramatically better circumstances, when the movie once again began to disguise itself as a soporific, I realized it was the movie, not me. I was not emotionally connecting with the movie. I was fascinated with Binoche. Once the movie shifted focus to Moretz, I was no longer engaged, and I should have been. Historically Moretz was excellent, but has seemed to plateau or been promoted to the level of her incompetence. Lately she is the weakest part of the movie, which is disappointing. The younger actor should be someone who could theoretically blow the protagonist out of the water or attitude wise, could be the protagonist when she was younger though not necessarily a literal mini me.
Clouds of Sils Maria is a pyramid with Binoche as the stable base. Stewart holds up her end of the bargain though unlike some reviewers, I was not blown away by her performance. She is chill and intimate like a friend, but in her enthusiasm, unwittingly wounds her boss. The way that an assistant molds her boss’ life was one of the best aspects of the film. She was the lens through which the protagonist saw the world, a mediator. Moretz’s character or interpretation of the character just drains the ebbing energy of this story until it is practically dead at the denouement. It is precisely the wrong energy to bring to a film about an actor transitioning to another stage in life, fearing it as a kind of rehearsal to death and acting out as a result of it. Her character should be life. The movie should have felt as if it was winding down as opposed to most films that end with an explosive denouement because Binoche’s character gradually accepts where she is in life, not because Moretz’s acting feels self-conscious, clunky and broad.
Actors may enjoy Clouds of Sils Maria more than the ordinary viewers because Binoche’s depiction of the process of becoming a character was intriguing. In the first third of the film, she is sexy, confident and the center of a whirlwind of attention. In the middle, her entire demeanor and mode of dress has changed. She even begins to act as needy as her character, and as if her assistant is her lover about to betray her while simultaneously resentful of having to engage in this process. I appreciated that it never became literal, but the tension was still there. By the end of the movie, we see the process begin again. She begins to return to herself in a more reserved manner, changed and resolute. I kind of hated that Assayas belabored foreboding that ultimately never happens, which is a late development. He is the only filmmaker who shows a gun to his audience, but it is actually a stapler.
I prefer Pedro Almodovar’s Pain and Glory to Clouds of Sils Maria even though they address similar themes: aging, death, work, relationships. This movie kept it as an intellectual exercise about the play when it was really the characters discussing themselves and each other. It never gets bone deep except for brief moments. I loved how Assayas showed a scene without explanation then in the next scene at a different location, we would find out what we had seen earlier. The film does not create the illusion of the viewer being omnipotent. If we are in one location, at the same time, we cannot see what is occurring in another location. It is a movie filled with missed calls, delivered messages, but also a movie in which if a person mentions a place, we can see it momentarily even if the character cannot. Assayas spends a lot of time comparing image with reality. Both have secrets that we never see. What was in the note!
Clouds of Sils Maria refers to a natural phenomenon in Switzerland, which dominates the middle of the film. Unfortunately I have no idea how this cloud formation was supposed to add texture and nuance to the story other than as another connection to her past, loss and as another link to the play. I have no idea if it was more visually impressive on the big screen. I am a city girl, but I enjoy mountains and clouds yet this imagery did not creatively speak to me. Maybe I am a Philistine. I get the purity and truth that the environment permits the characters to experience, but it is one of the few times that I missed the hurly burly of the bookends. This section gave me time to get to know the characters on a deeper level, and I was not engaged. Based on how the characters react to each other, neither were they.
I am an ordinary person and do not believe that I have ever been the center of attention for my talent or beauty for longer than a few minutes so if you expect me to resonate with Binoche feeling the loss of that adulation when she is older, still more talented, beautiful and successful than most of us will be on a single day of our lives, I just can’t. I didn’t resent her for it and understood her sorrow on an intellectual level. I just thought, “You’ll be alright.” I would trade her for her problems yesterday even if it meant literally getting Stewart as an assistant. I need the help.
Dear Clouds of Sils Maria viewers, something bugs me about this movie. I saw the intertitle for Part Two and Epilogue, but not part one. Was it there? How did I miss it both times? I do not regret watching Binoche do her thing, but I know that I do not get the fuss. Maybe I need someone to explain this movie to me.