High Life (2018)

Claire Denis's first foray into sci-fi is titled High Life, probably because she was high on something when she wrote this incoherent mess. She just hopes that you don't ask any questions, especially why and how. How did he raise Willow in this spaceship? How did she learn to speak English? How does she know what a dog is? What is the point of Dr. Dibs's experiment? What if she succeeds...then what, they're on a one-way mission anyways. And who cares? It's not like she's breaking new ground, she's just being creepy. She truly does look like a witch; one whose English sounds weird for some reason, which is strange because Juliette Binoche speaks perfectly good English. And what if they succeed in the larger mission? Then what...how are they supposed to harness the energy of a black hole? What good does that do anyone on Earth? The premise just makes no sense. And the design is not your typical futuristic space ship. This is no Starship Enterprise. It is a bleak shoebox, dark, low tech, uninviting. Robert Pattinson has really proven himself to be quite the actor though. They're going to start casting him in daddy roles soon enough.

Three Colours: Blue (Trois couleurs: Bleu) (1993)

I really wanted to like this film, but I was kind of underwhelmed. It is about so much more than grief. It is about the liberty of a woman without anymore family. Juliette Binoche is absolutely stunning. It's a beautifully shot movie. The colors are striking.  I just wasn't really able to connect with the movie. It didn't move me; I think it may be another one that requires a viewer with more life experienced. Music is very important to the plot of the movie. But I don't think the music was all that good, to be honest. It didn't have the emotional heft that such a movie demanded. The Three Colours trilogy is based on the themes of the French Revolution. And this movie is appropriately uniquely French (the nonchalance of the lover and her child). 

Mauvais Sang/The Night is Young (1986)

Denis Lavant is a brooding teenager torn between two women in future Paris. It's a sci-fi gangster movie that actually revolves around romance. It is hard to explain, but the tone of the movie is sci-fi even if the elements of science fiction remain unseen. Somehow it feels futuristic without looking it. Lavant's ringtone is Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet, alluding to tragic love though I'm not sure the ending is so tragic. Perhaps it is actually freeing. There is a famous scene in which Lavant dances to Modern Love by David Bowie. Maybe dance isn't the right word. He contorts his body and drags and beats himself as if he is trapped.  Greta Gerwig in Frances Ha does an homage to this scene. Leos Carax is a stylish director. And I love his clever pseudonym. Put the spaces in the right plae and it spells Le Oscar a X, like The Oscar goes to X.