Subtle film about French colonial legacy in Tahiti

Pacifiction (France/Germany/Spain/Portugal, 2022)

Directed by Albert Serra

Review by Iva Apostolova

Despite the fact that Pacifiction enjoyed only a limited screening in Ottawa’s ByTowne Cinema in early March this year, it is currently streaming on AppleTV. It is true that the movie’s whopping nearly three-hour length is a bit of a deterrent for theatre showings, but I’m hoping it will be picked up by more streaming platforms, as it is a tremendous movie. Upon its festival premier in 2022, Pacifiction quickly garnered an envious number of nominations (34 to be precise), among them the Palme d’Or and Queer Palm, winning 13 awards in total, including the César for Best Actor (Benoît Magimel) and Best Cinematography (Artur Tort).

Directed by the Catalan director Albert Serra (who often works in French), the movie is almost entirely carried out by one of French cinema’s best, yet understated, actors, Benoît Magimel. I was not surprised in the least by Serra’s choice of a leading man – strong chin, signature French pout, brooding blue eyes and a dollop of fearlessness when it comes to character choices. Magimel’s film credits include such gems as La haine, Les enfants du siècle, Le roi danse, La pianiste, La possibilité d’une ïle, La tête haute I’ve always thought of him as two parts Alain Delon and one part Vincent Cassel. Pacifiction is every bit the epic story that the plot summary suggests it is. Shot entirely in French Polynesia, mostly in Gaugin’s paradise, Tahiti, the movie is not shy to put on display the unforgettable Polynesian natural setting (there are otherworldly sunsets and plenty of wide shots of the island from a helicopter) against whose backdrop a very different drama/ trauma is silently unfolding. Magimel’s character, known to the viewer only as De Roller, is the French High Commissioner in Tahiti. He is the epitome of a bon vivant – impeccably dressed in white linen suits and brightly coloured shirts, soft spoken, sporting blue tinted glasses and despite the heat, always a flawlessly styled coif. But that’s precisely where a discrepancy, a dissonance of sorts begins to creep in. The more you expect De Roller’s political and moral corruption to ooze out of his character the same way his paunch protrudes out of his mid-section, the more Magimel will make you question your assumptions. When a self-righteous French admiral arrives on the island in a submarine, and rumours of renewed nuclear testing, much like the ones the French government carried out for three decades all the way through the ’90s, start swirling, we see De Roller literally spring to life. On the surface, the High Commissioner doesn’t do anything out of the ordinary – he is driven around in his ostentatious white car visiting local bars and restaurants, engaging in seemingly mundane chit-chat with a troupe of Polynesian dancers about their costumes, travelling to nearby atolls to have drinks with old friends. To top it all off, there is a hint of a romance between the High Commissioner and a transwoman, portrayed by the beautiful Pahoa Mahagafanau. The romance is as ambiguous as it is symbolic of De Roller’s relationship with the islands themselves. And yet we realize, almost at the last minute, that all this time while dining and sipping on exotic drinks, De Roller is, in fact, negotiating with the highest of powers, imperceptibly steering the island politics in one direction or another but, above all, trying to act as a human shield against what everyone fears will once more devastate this paradise. If there is any moral of the story, it is this: politics is done in the liminal space of soft-spoken hints and glances, and it is carved out of compromises rather than in loud proclamations, fist-pumping or marches.

I found myself mesmerized by Serra’s documentary-like style of shooting where it seems as though he’s left the camera rolling until, finally, something actually happens in front of it. The experienced viewer will, no doubt, be reminded of Claire Denis’ cinematographic signature; there are parallels to be drawn between Denis’ Stars at Noon and Serra’s Pacifiction, right down to the white linen suits of the male protagonists. But while in Denis’ movies the main character really is the landscape itself, which, much to my annoyance, makes her human participants appear random, their actions gratuitous, Serra’s protagonists are emphatically purposeful, his symbolism controlled. Where Stars at Noon gets lost in its own self-indulgent ambiguity, Pacifiction leads the viewer gently but unmistakably down the rocky path of reflecting on France’s colonial past and its complicated legacy.

Running time: 2h 45m

Rated 14A

Streaming on AppleTV

Iva Apostolova is a professor of philosophy at Dominican University College and a regular film reviewer.

A Ghost Waits (U.S., 2020)

Directed by Adam Stovall

Review by Barbara Popel

Movies about ghosts are perennially popular, ranging from The Amityville Horror to Ghostbusters to The Eternal Daughter. But have you heard of A Ghost Waits? It’s a 2020 micro-budget horror/romcom which has a “93 per cent fresh” critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes and garnered a four-star review in the Guardian newspaper. The film, the director, Adam Stovall, and the two principal actors, MacLeod Andrews (he also co-wrote the screenplay with Stovall) and Natalie Walker won top prizes at Screamfest, FrightFest and the Nevermore festival. Not too shabby for a first effort by Stovall and his crew.

A Ghost Waits starts off as a classic haunted house story. There’s this nondescript rental two-storey house in suburban Cincinnati. Whenever new tenants move in, they rapidly leave with no explanation, often leaving all their possessions behind them in their haste. We see one young couple and their two kids scared out of their wits – and out of the house – by a terrifying dark-haired female ghost who hovers near the ceiling. The ghost smiles, satisfied with the result.

Pardon me, she’s a “spectral agent” – it’s 2021 and ghosts have been rebranded.

The property management company that owns the house sends a handyman, Jack (Andrews), to prep the place so it can be rented again. And, while he’s at it, could Jack find out what’s causing all the tenants to break their leases and leave? Jack is a lonely guy, but he’s happy with the work he does. (How often do we see a blue collar worker doing his job and taking great pride in his work...what a rare sight that is in the movies!)

Jack does his “diagnostics” of what works and whether anything needs to be repaired or cleaned. Initially, he’s oblivious to the doors opening by themselves, odd noises, even a woman’s voice harmonizing with him when he’s singing a romantic song. That night, Jack has to stay in the house because none of his acquaintances will let him crash at their places while his apartment building is being fumigated. He goes to sleep in his sleeping bag on the living room floor. The ghost (Walker) finally gets his attention when he wakes up in one of the beds upstairs, with a metronome ticking away. Jack gets up, there are thumping and sobbing sounds, he reaches for the door handle and…! But nope, his alarm goes off and he wakes up in his sleeping bag. Just a bad dream, he thinks.

In the morning, Jack hangs around the house, waiting for the movers who will pack and remove several households’ worth of stuff. And that’s when Muriel (for that’s the ghost’s – sorry, spectral agent’s – name) asks him, “Why are you here?” “To fix the house,” he says (where is this woman’s voice coming from??). “This house is not broken,” she says. “I like your singing. You should do it somewhere else.” Then Muriel ramps up her haunting – the doorbell rings when no one’s there, Jack’s “diagnostic” tape marks all over the house disappear, then –disaster! His pizza disappears! Jack has another scary night and another very weird “dream,” this one involving Muriel being his double. And in the morning, Muriel throws all her haunting arsenal at Jack – crying babies, music that won’t stop, banging doors, unearthly screaming – and Jack meets Muriel face to face. He runs screaming from the house. Then the film takes a surprising but believable turn into romcom territory. There’s so much to love about this film. The haunting scenes are genuinely scary, particularly because of the black-and-white cinematography and the excellent sound cues. With a dandy script and excellent actors, you care what happens to Jack and Muriel. Muriel’s boss is a letter-perfect minor bureaucrat – and hilarious given she’s managing a bunch of spectral agents whose job is to haunt houses “because that’s what we do.” The director has chosen great indie songs for Jack to play and for background music. All of this, and the film was made on a shoestring budget. Impressive. A Ghost Waits has got horror, humour and heart. Highly recommended!

Running time: 79 minutes

Rated: unrated Available on YouTube, Google Play and Apple TV

Barb Popel has been an avid filmgoer since the early 1970s. In her twicemonthly column Magic in the Dark in Apt613.ca, she recommends upcoming films at the ByTowne and the Mayfair.