TITANE - A LOVE LETTER TO DAVID CRONENBERG

David Cronenberg is a major influence in my life - Julia Ducournau, filmisnow.com

Crash  / 
Titane

This isn’t a review or a critique of Julia Docournou’s Titane. While there’s certainly lots of misunderstood reviews and think-pieces out there, you can still find some solid reviews on the film if you look hard enough. Titane is something that touches on everything from auto-eroticism & body transformation to childhood trauma & the idea of family. There’s a lot going on and a lot to write about and plenty to decipher. I just don’t think there’s any point to add yet another “review” or opinion on this heavily talked about film. I would like it to be known that I really am fascinated by this film...

My specific fascination with Titane concerns Ducournau‘s love of David Cronenberg and the imprint he has on her work.

*THIS CONTAINS HEAVY VISUAL SPOILERS SO IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN TITANE YET - DO NOT KEEP READING*

It’s no mystery that Titane is heavily influenced by David Cronenberg’s Crash. That was the big selling point coming out of it’s Cannes debut. Outside of both films being about intense auto-eroticism, Julia Ducournau has admitted to the influence herself…

I prefer the term ‘mutation’ inherited from Cronenberg - Julia Docournou

Crash  / 
Titane

Crash  / 
Titane

Crash  / 
Titane

Crash  / 
Titane

The biggest Crash homage is the opening sequence. It’s not so much that both films essentially start with intense car wrecks. It’s the immediate cut to the operating table in both Titane & Crash that makes the connection stronger…

Crash  / 
Titane

But the Crash influence is just one layer. I’d go so far to say that it’s almost surface. Cronenberg’s DNA is all over Titane. Not just Crash.
In fact - Cronenberg has influenced Julia Ducournau l since day one…

David Cronenberg is a major influence in my life. I discovered his films when I was a teenager - Julia Ducournau, focusfeatures.com

Faith Healer / 
Raw

The Fly / 
Junior

It should also be mentioned that Titane co-star (and veteran filmmaker) Bertrand Bonello also has some light ties to Cronenberg as well.
In On War, Mathieu Amalric (who plays a character name “Bertrand”) watches eXistenZ in one scene…

eXistenZ in Bonello's On War

Throughout the film I caught imagery from Cronenberg’s early (and almost never talked about) stuff like Fast Company…

Fast Company / 
Titane

...to M Butterfly in terms of transformed gender roles. Vincent Lindon’s obliviousness (…denial?) to the true identity of Adrien in Titane is quite similar to Jeremy Irons’ mindstate  in M Butterfly

M Butterfly / 
Titane

Then there’s his more well know films which seemed to have rubbed off in various ways…

Scanners / 
Titane

Dead Ringers / 
Titane

A History Of Violence / 
Titane

Dead Ringers / 
Titane

The Fly / 
Titane

Eastern Promises  / 
Titane

The Brood /  Titane

The Fly / 
Titane

The Fly / 
Titane

Maps To The Stars / 
Titane

Cosmopolis/ 
Titane

Shivers / 
Titane

Shivers / 
Titane

Dead Ringers / 
Titane

A History Of Violence / 
Titane

The Dead Zone / 
Titane

Shivers / 
Titane

At times Titane comes off like a slight reworking of Cronenberg’s Rabid more than Crash. Not only do both films begin with an auto accident that quickly transitions to the operating table (something brought to my attention by Martin Kessler), but the basic plot of the attractive woman that becomes a serial killer post-auto accident is basically the plot of Titane…

Rabid / 
Titane

Rabid / 
Titane

Rabid / 
Titane

A major positive of Titane (besides the fact that it exists) is that it got me to go back and think about how films like Fast Company & Rabid planted the seeds for Cronenberg’s fascination with the story of Crash (in addition to his obvious overall fascination with body transformation).

TWENTYNINE PALMS

One positive thing to come out of last year’s quarantine was being stuck inside and having time to reassess certain specific movies. I’m a Bruno Dumont guy (now more than ever after reading more about him), but the period between 2002-2009 (Twentynine Palms through Hadewijch) is a period in his filmography I hadn’t revisited due to the fact that I wasn’t a fan of that particular run. But sometimes tastes & opinions change (especially after gaining a better of understanding of the filmmaker’s background).
Twentynine Palms is a fascinating movie because it was made by someone (Dumont) that was sick & tired of being compared to someone else (Bresson). Dumont’s previous two films were compared to the work of Robert Bresson so much that he was once dubbed: “the son of Bresson” and “the rightful heir to Bresson”. Some filmmakers like that of Tarantino or Jarmusch don’t mind the association with filmmakers that came before them. Dumont represents that brand of filmmaker who, while so obviously influenced by those who came before them, still wants to stand on their own two feet.

It got to a point where Dumont intentionally made cynical & dismissive comments about being compared to Bresson in interviews…

H2N: In watching Hadewijch, I was immediately brought to Robert Bresson—

Bruno Dumont: Who? Luc Besson? [laughs]


All this business of homage & influence reminds me of a quote from Hal Hartley (another filmmaker often associated with Bresson and was once dubbed the “Jean Luc Godard of Long Island"). 

After years of being mentioned in the same sentence as Jim Jarmusch he once said:

Being mentioned in the same breath as Jim Jarmusch was kind of swell. I always thought god he must be so embarrassed to have to now tug not only the weight of his own reputation of work but of other people - Hal Hartley

This quote applies to Dumont in more ways than one. Not only was his work constantly associated with Robert Bresson (and still is), but he was also made in to a supporting player in the New French Extremity movement which was a film scene crafted by critics that grouped together a lot of filmmakers who had nothing to do with each other and were now suddenly put in to a clique.


With all that being said, Dumont’s third feature (and first kind of English speaking film) ended up being a direct homage to Antonioni’s Zabriskie Point with a climax right out of Deliverance. The film centers around an intentionally insufferable couple ("Katia" & "David") who’s relationship is put to the ultimate test on a semi-aimless road trip through the west coast. An interesting plot-point to the story is that the native Russian Katia doesn’t speak English while the American David doesn’t speak Russian. So as a compromise they both speak somewhat broken French to one another which only adds to the tension & miscommunication in their relationship. I don't know if this was done on purpose but it seems like Dumont was addressing the idea of miscommunication in relationships.


Outside of the basic plot and desert setting, Dumont crafts scenes to look exactly like Antonioni’s Zabriskie Point…

Zabriskie Point /
Twentynine Palms

And he’s quite open with his connection to the work of Antonioni (more than Bresson)…

Cinema is an art that comes with big history. I have learned and been influenced by Fellini, Antonioni and a lot of Italian masters. When you are young you want to copy and imitate - Bruno Dumont

He also acknowledges the Deliverance influence (it's too obvious not to)…

The moment of the film that received the most notice is the DELIVERANCE scene where the couple is set upon by a group of rednecks - Bruno Dumont

Deliverance / Twentynine Palms

So it’s not like he’s above admitting influence. Maybe he was just sick of being compared to Bresson exclusively…

my approach to filmmaking is the exact opposite of Bresson’s way of working. For example, the way I work with actors is completely different; I use location sound where Bresson looped everything. It’s quite strange to me to see critics and spectators constantly taking out their Bressonian toolkits to decode my films. It’s something I can’t control; I can’t stop people from doing that. I only discovered Bresson late in my life and I really don’t care about him that much - Bruno Dumont

Twentynine Palms sticks out the most within Dumont’s filmography (it’s the most “explosive” and violent) but that’s probably because he was still figuring himself out while dealing with the burden of being the (so-called) “heir” to Bresson (something he clearly didn’t want). 

I’m not sure where it “ranks” among his other work (the acting is still just as awkward/bad as I remembered it) but it’s an interesting film to come back to and revisit once you gain a better understanding of his style and where he was mentally at that point in his career.

LIBERTÉ

Liberté is a weird combination of sexual liberation and sexual repression happening at the same time. In the film we follow a group of high society “swingers” in 18th century France having a sexual romp in the woods. It’s a beautiful mixture of the bath house scene in Reygadas’ Post Tenebras Lux, the nightclub scenes in Friedkin’s Cruising and the climactic orgy scene at the end of Brian Yuzna’s Society (early on in Liberté we hear agonizing screams coming from the woods and I was immediately reminded of the screams coming from the bath house in Post Tenebras Lux). I enjoyed this movie a lot but I also felt the need to cleanse myself afterwards (for those of you familiar with the aforementioned films I compared Liberté to, you should understand). I don’t mean to get too gross but you could almost smell this movie at certain points. But perhaps that’s part of the point of the film. An unabashed/unflinching look at sex & sexuality which can be "gross" at times (it should be noted that bathing practices were a little different in the 18th century so the smells must have been extra potent).

There’s a very “matter of fact” approach in the acting style which highlighted things. There’s no guilty or surprised looks on the faces of the actors as they touch, fondle, screw & suck their way through the film. This hammers home the idea of their sexual liberation. The deadpan emotionless looks on the faces of the actors implies they aren’t ashamed of what they're doing. However, they are off in the woods secluded from the rest of the world which obviously implies some kind of shame or discretion. No matter how comfortable they are together, they all know this is something that can’t be done out in the open. 

I know I compare a lot of things to Bresson but the Bresson comparison is very valid here. Not only is the acting style in Liberté similar to films like L’Argent & The Devil Probably, but, like Bresson, Albert Serra uses (some) non-professional actors.


This felt like a callback to the films of the New French Extremity. If I went in to Liberté blind without knowing the actual director (Albert Serra) I would have thought it was made by the likes of Bertrand Bonello, Francois Ozon or Marina De Van (all varsity lettermen of the New French Extremity scene).
Liberté takes place in the woods and I was reminded of the opening sequence of Bonello’s Tiresia (another film that’s partially about sexual repression and sexual deviancy). In Tiresia we follow Lucas Laurent cruising the woods for prostitutes and if you take out the modern wardrobe (Tiresia is set in 2003), you'd think the events in the film were overlapping with Liberté (it should be noted that Liberte co-star Lliana Zabeth worked with Bertrand Bonello on The House Of Tolerance which also deals with similar subject matter)

Tiresia / Liberté

It also isn't too far-fetched to compare the events of Liberté to certain moments in Ozon's See The Sea (a movie that has a pretty memorable cruising scene in the woods)

See The Sea / Liberté

Or the more recent Stranger By The Lake...

Stranger By The Lake /
Liberte 

As for direct influences, Albert Serra was open about the fact that the look of the film was inspired by the artwork of François Boucher & Alexandre-Évariste Fragonard...

The events of Liberté brought me back to my three years of taking history of architecture in college where we learned about how (some) famous opera houses and music halls were designed with side rooms that were used for sexual romps and other debaucherous encounters.


Normally a film about sex has a tone or an overall ambiance that matches the subject matter. But that’s not really the case here. Liberté is intentionally cold which isn’t something that you don’t want to associate with sex. There is a softness & tenderness to some of the performances but at the end of the day Liberté is cold. I like to think that approach was intentional as to not fully distract from the beautiful backdrops & costume design. Sex is a beautiful thing (I don’t think Serra believes otherwise) but it can also be weird & strange. I imagine the average human being that enjoys having sex would think twice about joining in on the events presented in Liberté. There’s a “fluid” ambiguous feel to everything that not everyone would be down with (I certainly wouldn’t be). Helmut Berger’s presence in the film alone just adds to the sexual freeness & ambiguity as he’s known for his more “fluid” roles over the years.

Albert Serra uses Berger in the same way that he used Jean Pierre Leaud in The Death Of Louis XIV which is less of a performance and more like an artifact of the history of cinema he brings with him...

Helmut Berger in Liberte

Helmut Berger in The Damned

On the surface, Liberte comes off as a tool strictly to shock the viewer. But if you go a littler deeper (no pun intended), you’ll see that the events in this film branch off to everything from art to architecture and politics (this film is actually part of a larger multi-part/multi-media project). Liberte is also a reminder that a lot of the New French Extremity was rooted in and inspired by classic art, architecture & literature. There was a lot more to that scene than just shocking imagery.

I don’t know exactly where this movie ranks/sits on my “best of the year” list but I haven’t stopped thinking about it since first watching it over a month ago and that counts far more than some placement on a list...

A LOOK BACK AT THE NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY: TIRESIA

This right here is prime New French Extremity cinema (a French film label/movement from the early 00's). It has everything you'd expect from the genre all in one: isolated moments of brutal violence, sexual repression/confusion, sex crimes, three-ways, full frontal nudity, etc.
This movie also features PINNLAND EMPIRE favorite Alice Houri who, in my opinion, is quietly one of the most important figures from the New French Extremity Movement. Names like Gaspar Noe, Bruno Dumont, Claire Denis, Bertrand Bonello & more are associated with this genre but those are all directors. They're behind the camera. With the exception of folks like Tiresia co-star Lucas Laurent & Marina De Van (who is also a writer & director) there are very few repeat ACTORS to pop up the the various New French Extremity films. Alice is an exception. And not only is she a New French Extremity regular, but she makes appearances in some of the better/more challenging films/scenes from the genre (even in cameos her presence is truly felt)...

ALICE HOURI IN THE FILMS OF THE NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY

The Pornographer

Trouble Every Day

Tiresia

I'm not sure if Betrand Bonello is a pervert (which isn't exactly all bad as long as it's to no one's detriment) or just very very open sexually. Sexual Lines are often blurred and/or crossed in his films. With The Pornographer (also co-starring Alice Houri) Bertrand used real pornographic actors & actresses having real sex on camera. In The Portrait Of An Artist (a film starring but not directed by Bonello) he essentially plays himself and we see him in bisexual orgies and other scenarios some might consider to be kinky and/or perverse. The House Of Tolerance delves in to the kinky and sometimes sadistic sexual desires of men and the movie of discussion, Tiresia, is full of awkward, cringeworthy and problematic issues concerning sex & sexuality.
It's difficult to not personalize & associate Bertrand Bonello with his own films. If he isn't playing a slightly fictionalized version of himself (The Portrait Of The Artist), his films are about his own life or the art of filmmaking (On War & The Pornographer).


In Tiresia we follow a trans prostitute who is kidnapped and held against her will by a priest. This priest is attracted to Tiresia but only as a trans woman. This becomes a problem because Tiresia needs to take her hormone medicine regularly in order to stay a women but she's held captive and has no way of getting them. The priest doesn't seem to get this and over time our protagonist makes the unwanted transition back to a male. Frustrated by this, the priest - who has now lost his attraction to Tiresia in her male form - disfigures her and leaves her for dead (she's eventually rescued and nursed back to health minus her new incurable disfigurement).
The second half of the film then shifts in to a story about religion, faith & transformation

Former New French Extremity all-star Bruno Dumont is often considered to be the heir to Robert Bresson's throne but I think Bonello deserves to share that throne. While Bresson would never make a film like Tiresia (or just about anything from the new French Extremity) his influence is all over Bertrand's film. Lucas Laurent's priest (along with certain specific scenes) are right out of Diary Of A Country Priest...

Tiresia / The Diary Of A Country Priest (Bresson)

or The Trial Of Joan Of Arc...

The Trial Of Joan Of Arc / Tiresia

Tiresia is also an example of The New French Extremity’s ability to be mature. True – a lot of these extreme films from the very late 90’s through the mid-00’s were partially about shock value, jump scares & other provocative moments (Tiresia certainly has plenty of that from unsimulated orgies to isolated moments of graphic violence) but filmmakers like Bonello & Dumont have a connection/fascination with the generations of French cinema that came before them which shows maturity and a respect for history.

Not only does Bertrand Bonello tip his hat to his elder Claire Denis by casting two of her regulars (Alice Houri & Alex Descas)…

But he also throws in some visual references to older French filmmakers like Jean Cocteau…

The Blood Of A Poet / Tiresia

Our priest character (played by New French Extremity regular Lucas Laurent) is a new take on the bad/sexually repressed religious figure (I was going to say a "breath of fresh air" but that wouldn't sound right). Instead of children, a trans woman is his victim this time around. while it is my opinion that children do make up the majority of the victims of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, all types of people can be and are victims of sexual abuse both inside & outside of the church. It should be noted how excellent Laurent plays his part in this film. While he certainly is the "villain", he plays the priest character like he's the victim or someone worthy of sympathy. If you taken certain isolated scenes from that movie out of context you'd think you were watching a film about a lonely priest going through an existential crisis.

LUCAS LAURENT IN THE FILMS OF THE NEW FRENCH EXTREMITY

In My Skin

Tiresia

Pola X

Large sections of society like to act as if the trans/LGBT community doesn't exist. Furthermore, trans women are being attacked, abused & murdered at an alarming rate. But mainstream media platforms rarely ever report this because, like I just said, the trans community is often ignored. this is one of the few films that gives an unflinching look at the abuse trans women face.