Titane

Started by Jeremy Blackman, October 19, 2021, 12:36:20 PM

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Jeremy Blackman



Written & directed by Julia Ducournau. Winner of the Palme d'Or.

Out now on VOD!


The pull quote from First Showing is perfect: "Not what you're expecting... not what anyone is expecting."

This movie is... a lot. I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about it, but it's clearly a singular artistic vision, and I love it for that.

Depending on your expectations, this might be more or less bonkers than what you're imagining, so I would advise keeping an open mind. My expectations were set inaccurately by my imagination and something I ran across that I thought was a spoiler (wasn't, really).

The trailer is actually a pretty accurate representation of the film.

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I was hoping for something more all-out science fiction, like more of a complete body transformation story. The body horror in Titane is not exactly my favorite kind (lots of self-injury). It was effective, though.

What do we think happened to Vincent's son?

WorldForgot

Haven't watched the trailer but I'm so looking forward to watching the film. One of my friends just kept emphasizing to me that no matter what i may imagine the film to "be" that it is thematically "bigger."

Jeremy Blackman

Quote from: WorldForgot on October 19, 2021, 12:47:34 PMOne of my friends just kept emphasizing to me that no matter what i may imagine the film to "be" that it is thematically "bigger."

Yup, that's what I'm still absorbing. It's thematically rich to an extreme, and not always subtle about it, but at the same time not spelled out for you at all.

Drenk

This movie is bad, and I'm particularly repulsed by its bad French vibes because I know where it's coming from (La FĂ©mis, the school of every "arty" French director). Like...I thought Ducournau was actually changing the game with Raw, and then...

No. Business as usual with tons of self-parody.

This is thematically hollow, too.

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The self-harm scenes are bad, bad, bad. A word I've used a lot in this short post, but...Ugh. They're not "scary", they're not purposeful, they have the shock value of a dick pic...So? You've got at least four scenes of that. Then five scenes of the main character looking at her belly, freaked out...Then six scenes of her hiding her breasts...That's half the movie, almost...

The first forty minutes are somewhat fun. Okay, you've got three short films in that section since Ducournau has no idea what story she wants to tell. Then it turns into the shittiest French movie ever but the reversal isn't strange, nothing truly changes in the tone of the movie...

I was thinking: okay, so the Dad is creepy, obviously, and seems to hate her daughter...okay...And Bonello looks creepy. Great casting. Okay. And Vincent, I guess, is supposed to be another version of the Dad, but it is flat and boring; it's just a moron saying he'll love her anyway, and...She's literally a robot. She accepts the script. She returns the love. But it is artificial.
Ascension.

WorldForgot

I'll have to rewatch Raw before I check this out. I remember being underwhelmed with that one, but even recently people prop it up as (at times) stronger than Titane.

Drenk

Maybe you'd enjoy Titane more without rewatching Raw, because comparing the "body horror" (loose term, I know) between the two would only reveal how artificial Titane is in every department. Thematically, Raw is also way less cowardly than her sophomore effort.
Ascension.

WorldForgot

I will revisit - as it's my preference to consider the trajectory of a career in the crafts when considering recent work. Regardless of medium I try to place things in the perspective of their release/distro continuum.

Yes

I was mixed on the first half of this. I found the provocations to be overplayed. But the 2nd half is genuinely exciting. Lindon nails his role. Some suspenseful dread. The Future Islands needledrop is superb. I dont know why people are calling this Cronenberg--felt more like young Harmony Korine. 

WorldForgot

They're calling it Cronenberg because in body horror canon you have not only Cronenberg's sense of biological growth, excess, and pleasure - but another film where

Spoiler: ShowHide
trauma and cars are sexually binding


Probably you knew that but I think when people are doing the catchphrase thing more peeps are likely to connect the visceral textual level correlation there than perhaps noticing like you its tonal games and furious humor.

This was dope. Sick soundtrack and body politic -
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wasn't expecting it to have slasher style choreograph, I had expected that most of the movie would play at more like the pre-conception moments; not as heightened or literalized. Personally pleasantly surprised with it. Continues the thread from Raw nicely. Its structure and text iz much more interesting to me, though.

polkablues

It felt to me like Ducournau had three totally separate movie ideas and couldn't figure out how to fully flesh out any of them, so she just crammed them all together into one story and this was the result. Raw was far from a perfect movie, but at least it was focused; this was almost like a stream-of-consciousness first draft that never fully figured out what it was about, and therefore ends up feeling like it's about nothing. But it's so audacious and creative on a moment-to-moment level, your brain wants to insist that it can't possibly be meaningless, it must be that you're just not getting it. Still, upon reflection, I'm leaning toward meaninglessness.
My house, my rules, my coffee

Jeremy Blackman

Quote from: polkablues on November 04, 2021, 10:51:53 PM
It felt to me like Ducournau had three totally separate movie ideas and couldn't figure out how to fully flesh out any of them, so she just crammed them all together into one story and this was the result. Raw was far from a perfect movie, but at least it was focused; this was almost like a stream-of-consciousness first draft that never fully figured out what it was about, and therefore ends up feeling like it's about nothing. But it's so audacious and creative on a moment-to-moment level, your brain wants to insist that it can't possibly be meaningless, it must be that you're just not getting it. Still, upon reflection, I'm leaning toward meaninglessness.

This is a bit harsh but unfortunately seems spot-on. I'm honestly still not sure how I feel about this movie.

Spoiler: ShowHide
If it had gone harder at the end, with some kind of full-blown alien transformation, I might be a passionate apologist for this movie. But as is, it's an experiment that maybe doesn't quite coalesce.

Robyn

This was pretty bad.

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There was some stuff I liked in the intro and towards the end. Put an industrial song over it and you have a pretty good erotic short film lol

Shughes

I agree with the point about there being multiple ideas crammed into one film.

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I loved the Lindon character and his storyline. The father and "son" stuff about unconditional love is sublime.

The issue I have is with the opening 30 mins or so. There is no real development or suggestion as to why she is killing people. Other than the fact that she needed to be on the run for the second/better story to work. It didn't feel earned.

I thought the ending was pretty perfect. He accepted her for who she was and was rewarded with the thing he wants most, a child. Meanwhile she is punished for her sins and dies.

I have some questions - the director claims that she does not die at the end but rather moves into her next phase of evolution. Is that to say she becomes the child - like an animal shedding it's skin? It has the same marking/metal plate on the side of the head as she does. Is the suggestion that she fully metamorphosises into his child? If so that kind of works for me.

But I have questions about the pregnancy. I like the squeamish body horror of it all but how did she get pregnant? Is it to do with her would be attacker, who she deals with before any physical assault can escalate? Or the car-sex, impregnated by machine? But then what is that all about - is it real or metaphorical? I could buy it as a subjective delusion - a step towards her aforementioned evolution. Except for the fact that she appears pregnant to others...

As I said, lots of questions. But the main story hit me on a gut level. There's enough here that I love to recommend it.