40th Anniversary of 'JEANNE DIELMAN' (1975-2015)
After 40 years, the meat pie recipe still works great!!
'AN EPIC DRAMA OF DOMESTICITY' - E. L.
Two weeks ago, we were all saddened to hear the death of
Chantal Akerman (1950-2015), who was possibly one of the most original and
iconic female directors in the history of cinema. With her original vision on
the human existence, she has made a number of iconic work throughout her 40
years of career. While most of these films may concentrate on a female
perspective, they can be considered as timeless and are still of high relevance
nowadays. Highly inspired by Jean-Luc Godard, she has been associated with the
feminist avant-garde movement of the 1970s, and was also heavily involved in
Experimental cinema. To me, Mme. Akerman’s work has a charisma and hypnotic
effect that is hard to rationalize beyond reason. Somehow, she has a deep
understanding of the way to make something truly cinematic. Of all of her great
work, one film stands out due to its stunning originality. This film is a bit
like Marmite – you either love it to an ecstatic level (like myself), or you
hate it and label it as the most boring cinematic experience in this universe. That
film is the masterpiece Mme. Akerman created when she was only 25 years old –
‘JEANNE DIELMAN’ (1975)!
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| Chantal Akerman (1950-2015) |
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| Delphine Seyrig |
Jeanne Dielman is such an iconic film character. She is the
character who literally defines the word ‘feminine’ in cinema. Portrayed by the
stunning Delphine Seyrig, who has appeared in iconic films like ‘Last Year At Marienbed’
and ‘The Discreet Charm of Bourgeoisie’, and also a director and an outright
speaker for female rights, Jeanne Dielman is possibly her most memorable role in
her career. Her wonderful and realistic portrayed of the middle-aged housewife
is a performance that many audience can likely identify with. If the ‘domestic
goddess’ has a name – it has to be ‘Jeanne Dielman’.
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| Jeanne Dielman and her son |
The plot of the story is so simple, yet its simplicity is
contrasted with the complex undertones hidden in every frame of the film.
Jeanne Dielman is a widowed housewife who lives with her son in a middle-class environment.
She is very ‘professional’ in the chores she needs to do as a housewife –
cooking, cleaning, helping her son with homework etc. At the same time, she
also moonlights (if that’s the right way to state it) as a prostitute for middle-aged
or old men in the afternoon, when her son has not yet come back from school.
The film depicts, almost in real-time manner, 3 days of Mme.
Dielman’s life. The first day, everything is working absolutely great, as if a
mechanical clockwork is operating. However, at the second day, during her
moonlighting ordeal in the afternoon, something rather unexpected has happened
(spoiler). Things start to go wrong, which commences with the overcooking of
her potatoes (yes it is THAT important for her). At the third day, all hell
breaks loose for Mme. Dielman. Things are not going smooth or as planned, and
the accumulation of all the stresses will eventually lead to an extremely
shocking ending – which you have to watch it yourself...
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| For some reason, the kettles in Akerman's films have a hypnotic effect on me (just like in 'La Chambre'). I can't stop showing these. |
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| The kettle in 'La Chambre'. |
‘Jeanne Dielman’ is such a complex character study that one
can apply numerous perspectives to appreciate it. I would say there is no way I
will be able to access all these perspectives, and even more there is no way I
will be able to understand this story from a female’s perspective. I hope what
I can do here is to elaborate on those angles that I can observe from the film.
The film is considered as an important work in both feminist
and anti-illusionist cinema, and Akerman’s background and influences have been
able to contribute to these 2 fields through the film.
Akerman has been a practitioner of the ‘Feminist
avant-garde’ movement of the 1970s. The whole point of the movement was to
deconstruct the gender norms and also the patriarchal gaze so inherent in many
of the major films. While the protagonist of ‘Jeanne Dielman’ is certainly a
female, she is not portrayed in a Rita Hayworth style (disclaimer – I like
Hayworth), which in a sense serves as a visual pleasure for the male audience.
What Jeanne does in the film are the mundane work that a female will likely to
encounter in the real world, therefore, as Akerman has put it, the film is a
‘phenomenal’ study of femininity, or an
exposition of the ‘female experience’. Though, I have to add, the equal sex situation
nowadays may make this film seem a bit dated, yet I suppose the experience
perceived by Jeanne in the film is still highly identifiable by many of the
contemporary audience.
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| The wonderful Chantal Akerman starring in 'La Chambre'. |
On the other hand, especially in the 1970s, Akerman’s style
tends to be aiming towards anti-illusionism. The term is coined from the field
of Art History, and it can also be nicely applied to Theatre or Experimental Cinema.
Akerman creates a sort of heightened and detached feel in ‘Jeanne Dielman’,
very much like the distanciation advocated by Brecht or the style in Godard’s
film. As audience, we quietly observe Jeanne’s ordeal from a distance, but not
in a voyeuristic manner like those films involving ‘female objects’. According
to the film theorist Sitney, anti-illusionist cinema is often attributed to a
number of key properties:
1. Fixed camera position / fixed framing
2. Flicker Effect
3. Loop printing
4. Rephotography
In the case of ‘Jeanne Dielman’, the first point is most
relevant. The iconic style of the film is its extremely static framing. Not
only the key action is recorded almost in real time (which suggests plenty of
long takes), the camera position barely moves when the actions unfold. If the
focus is on Jeanne, then in order to follow her action, the director should be
using either tracking shot, or cuts to ‘catch up’ with her when she is moving
in the cinematic space. This is NOT the case in the film. When Jeanne, for
example, has to get something from a cupboard far away, instead of following
her action, she simply walks off-screen – the camera still focuses on the
static objects in the kitchen, and there are no significant camera movements.
This is more than usual when you compare with most of the films involving, I
suppose, human beings, right? ‘Jeanne Dielman’, in a sense, is the exploration
of cinematic time.
Yet, it is certainly unfair to say the whole film takes
place in real time, because Akerman did abstract out certain parts of the plot
and presented them in an elliptic manner. The only sequences that are shown in
real time are those involving the house work and chores, those which Akerman
has considered as real ‘feminine experience’. Those scenes involving male
audience’s visual pleasure, i.e. her moonlighting job, are shown in an elliptic
manner. By the abstraction choice, Akerman allows the audience to confront the
true nature of female existence, rather than an escapist cinema merely for
entertainment.
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| Jeanne peeling potatoes. This is pure acting - Mme. Seyrig's finest hour. |
The reason why Jeanne Dielman is such an iconic character is
because she is mysterious and so ... strange. Akerman’s intention to make this
film is to provide a critique on the ‘feminine existence’, and to show that the
social norm can lead to a severe repression in their psyches. These sentiments
are nicely demonstrated and executed by the great lady Delphine Seyrig, and she
can totally capture the despair and helplessness so inherent in Jeanne Dielman.
Jeanne Dielman was a stoic-looking housewife. In the most
part of the film, she has not shown any intense emotion, and she has not
provided any heart-to-heart talk with any people around her, even with her son
(remember how monotone she read a Baudelaire poem? ). When she was dealing with
the different duties in the house, she was extremely focused and seemed to be
able to reach all the tedious tasks in the most effective manner. Her almost mechanical action, repetitive
regimen showed the audience that she was entrapped in her role as a feminine. Jeanne
Dielman’s timetable was always fully-booked – she has been able to fit
something into every single time slot, and she would execute that task in a machine-like
manner. Of course, when something starts to go wrong, the system known as
Jeanne Dielman would fall apart...
Indeed, the genius of the role was that, with the minimal
gesture and action, the maximum impact is instilled onto the audience. When
Jeanne realized that she has unfortunately overcooked the potatoes for dinner, all
the plans fell apart. The part when she was peeling the potatoes in real-time
was monumental – with her facial expressions and gestures, audience could
easily feel her frustrations of the failure. When she was making the meat pie
the next day, she was literally overdoing it and venting her misery into the
pile of minced meat. Things went absolutely berserk for Jeanne – not getting
the usual seat in the coffee shop, not getting a button, not knowing what to
reply to her sister in a letter. These are minor diversions of our life, but in
Jeanne’s case, these were major blows to her coldly calculated schedule. Jeanne
was most vulnerable when her ‘planned’ actions were diverted, and she literally
did not know what to do, or what else she could do, in those moments. A rather
memorable scene was that when she has mis-managed something, she came to the
sitting room and lied on the couch, feeling nervous and had no idea how to kill
the spare time. She could not appreciate the many enjoyable aspects of human
existence, as she was so entrapped in her identity. This is the existential
despair of Jeanne Dielman, and if the audience can start to sympathize and raise
questions about her, then the film has succeeded. And, to appreciate all these,
you have to experience every single minute of this great film.
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| Jeanne, after committing something beyond her belief |
Rest in peace, Madame Chantal Akerman. Thank you for making
such an iconic masterpiece!
by Ed Law
18/10/2015
Film Analysis - 61
