How many of my relatives will want to see this in theaters? Will it break the Summer Movie Wager? One of my favorite aspects of this film is the way it shapeshifts as you watch it, revealing itself slowly over time. Taking place over a single afternoon, the film revolves around a mediated conversation between parents at a school regarding an incident that occurred between their two year-six-year-old sons. This is a tense, powerfully acted drama which deals in heavy emotions and which gives its dialogue ample room to breathe.
It keeps you on your toes, zagging from its naturalistic premise to become something considerably more provocative. She gives the sort of fearless, multi-layered, enigmatic performance that could tie even a weak script together. This one was a real highlight for me, not only of Un Certain Regard but of the whole festival to date. Truth be told, I often find myself skipping them for the sake of sleep.
But The Balconettes was simply too intriguing to pass up. And boy is it a wild ride: think something like Drive-Away Dolls if it were about 10x darker and featured, among other things, a mutilated penis head.
What blew me away about The Balconettes , though, was the searing message at its core. I expected to cheer, jeer, and cover my eyes at a midnight premiere. I never expected to walk away feeling genuinely moved. Pulling off both is a serious feat. I try to open these reviews with a little context about the filmmaker and their body of work.
Take Swing Vote , wherein he plays the politically apathetic everyman who is suddenly forced to call an election. Roxana Hadadi wrote a great piece on the subject. All of which is to say nothing of a certain television juggernaut anchored by Costner, which has taken precisely half of the nation by storm.
