Two Days, One Night, itself the winner of 40 international awards, is just the latest to follow this exceptional trend. It’s a film utterly unique in so many ways, yet perfectly consistent with the Dardenne filmography.
Paolo Virzi, the veteran Italian director of the new film Human Capital, got his coffee, and upon sitting down at our small table at the JW Marriott Suite, peaked over my shoulder, proceeded to guess the first question I was about to ask and then lovingly pinched my cheek in jest like a warm Italian …
The end of Sandra’s (Marion Cotillard) journey does not matter, it is the journey that does. And though that sounds entirely conventional, even cliché, it might be the brilliance of Belgian auteurs Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne; their ability to get away with plot points that would seem at home in the most Hollywood, middlebrow fare comes off as resonant, enthralling, and emotionally realistic. Thus, in Two Days, One Night, the Dardennes prove their relevancy and potency as directors once again.
Sandra (Marion Cotillard) spends the majority of Two Days, One Night knocking on the doors of her co-workers and modestly pleading with them to decline a significant pay bonus so that she can save her job and her family. Some are instantly receptive to her request while others blow her off and even resort to violence. It’s an episodic structure that is executed with measured precision and tension from master Belgian auteurs and critical darlings Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne (The Kid with a Bike, L’Enfant). Acting as the antithesis of the hardworking, stubborn, and desperate titular character from the directing duo’s immaculate Rosetta (1999), Sandra’s glowing and unwavering empathy towards those who stand in opposition to her is the crux of her character and the streamlined grace that runs through this humbled marvel of a film.
While some of us are still playing catch-up with films we missed in 2013, there’s no shame in looking ahead to the seemingly marvelous lineup of films that await us cinephiles in 2014. The buzz will be fast and contagious with festivals like Sundance, Berlinale, Rotterdam, and Cannes just around the corner; below is my …
7. Leviafan (Andrey Zvyagintsev) Andrey Zvyagintsev’s The Return and Elena were mysterious, slow-burning films. His 2014 entry, Leviafan, described by IMDb as “human insecurity in a ‘new country’” should mark a definite return to the Cannes Film Festival. 6. Winter Sleep (Nuri Bilge Ceylan) Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan’s film Once Upon a Time in …