The late Chantal Akerman's final fiction film—an updating of Joseph Conrad's 1895 titular first novel to the late 20th century—exhibits both the director's stylistic formalism and her general lack of concern for conventional narrative. The film begins with a strikingly surreal sequence in which a lounge singer, lip-synching to Dean Martin's recording of “Sway,” is stabbed to death onstage, after which one of his backup dancers sings Mozart's “Ave verum corpus.” The story then flashes back in time to show Almayer (Stanislas Merhar), a perpetually despondent European stuck at a remote river outpost somewhere in Southeast Asia, agreeing to send his young mixed-race daughter Nina to a boarding school in France. Returning years later, Nina (Aurora Marion) takes up and runs off with a dangerous young man at the urging of her embittered mother, despite Almayer's warnings that the man will hurt and betray her. To label this a portrait of familial dysfunction would be a gross understatement, but Almayer's Folly is also both a none-too-subtle commentary on the disastrous effect of European colonization, and a story of obsessive passion (Almayer's protestations to his daughter that no one will ever love her more than he does—drenched in the strains of the prelude to Wagner's Tristan und Isolde—become positively creepy). Akerman devotees will likely find this slow-moving film to be hypnotically mesmerizing, while others will no doubt consider it pretentious. A strong optional purchase. (F. Swietek)
Almayer's Folly
Icarus, 127 min., in French, English & Khmer w/English subtitles, not rated, DVD: $26.99 Volume 32, Issue 2
Almayer's Folly
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