The same year Bertrand Bonello's The Beast, one of his most elaborate films, arrived in American theaters, Coma, one of his most minimalist, also made the rounds. He didn't make them at the same time, so it was largely coincidental. The former is an inventive adaptation of a Henry James novella in which two actors play characters who interact in different timelines, whereas the latter is an experimental film inspired by the year his daughter spent in lockdown.
In the prologue, Bonello layers inter-titles over hyper-granulated images from his 2016 thriller Nocturama, which was dedicated to 18-year-old Anna, and in the epilogue, he stitches together footage of extreme environmental events. Through the on-screen text, the French director explains the project while electronic music whirs on the soundtrack. He sees the film as a gesture of hope since he always believed that things would get better. Though he addresses Anna, he is also addressing the audience.
His ninth narrative feature begins in earnest with a young woman (Louise Labèque from Bonello's supernatural-tinged Zombi Child) at her computer watching a YouTube channel featuring a slippery lifestyle guru named Patricia Coma (Julia Faure in a succession of fashionable outfits), who promotes predetermination and a gizmo called the Revelator. Even when the girl isn't engaging with any of her electronic devices, Patricia turns up on occasion, a possible sign that cabin fever has taken hold.
Alone in her room, the girl also imagines that her knockoff Barbie dolls are caught up in a melodrama about lust, infidelity, and regret complete with canned audience laughter and tweets from Donald Trump spoken as dialogue. The characters are voiced by Vincent Lacoste, Anaïs Demoustier, Laetitia Casta, Louis Garrel, and the late Gaspard Ulliel from Bonello's Saint Laurent--the actor was killed in a ski accident the same year, 2022, that Coma premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival.
Throughout, the girl engages in an animated conversation with a philosophical serial killer, chats with friends on Zoom about their favorite murderers, and wanders through a monochromatic, dream-like forest filled with the souls of the dead--one of whom, French singer Bonnie Banane, breaks into song. Into the collage, Bonello also throws in clips of philosopher Gilles Deleuze and a glittery Romy Schneider from Henri-Georges Clouzot's Inferno, Serge Bromberg's 2009 take on an unfinished film from 1964.
Increasingly, these things mix and mingle as the dolls repeat the girl's words, the killer appears to target her friend Tess (Ninon François), and Patricia pops up in the dream forest. Bonello doesn't break any of this down in a way that's easy to decipher, making it one of his more impenetrable films, though it retains the high production values of his more accessible narratives.
The filmmaker has described Coma as the third feature in a youth trilogy with Nocturama and Zombi Child, and when viewed from that perspective, it gains in stature as part of a larger project involving political activism, generational trauma, and changing times. On its own, though, it's one of his least substantial films, even as it comes from a place of genuine affection and concern.
What film collection does this belong in?
Coma belongs in academic and public libraries with other films by Bertrand Bonello, like House of Tolerance and Saint Laurent, even if isn't quite up to their standards. More generally, it would fit in French and International collections.
What kind of film series would this movie fit in?
Coma would fit in a film series on Bertrand Bonello, including his shorts and acting performances (Portrait of the Artist, Titane), or a series on narrative features that deal specifically with the pandemic, like Radu Jude's Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn.
What type of library programming could use this title?
Library programming on pandemic-era filmmaking could use Coma as part of an adventurous lineup.