DIRECTOR: CLAIRE DENIS
STARRING: VINCENT LINDON, CHIARA MASTROIANNI, JULIE BATAILLE, MICHEL SUBOR, LOLA CRÉTON, ALEX DESCAS, GRÉGOIRE COLIN
FRANCE, 2013
98 MINS
RATING – 18
Our season journeys right into the heart of darkness with Bastards, a haunting and uncompromising neo-noir nightmare.
After receiving an S O S, Marco Silvestri (Vincent Lindon), a captain on a supertanker, returns to Paris. Marco’s brother-in-law has died, his sister is on the verge of bankruptcy and about to lose the family shoe factory, and his niece has been badly injured. He writes checks for his sister, Sandra (Julie Bataille), and visits his niece, Justine (Lola Créton). He also moves into a sprawling apartment, throwing a mattress on the polished parquet floor, and begins watching a neighbor, Raphaëlle (Chiara Mastroianni), who lives with her young son, Joseph (Yann Antoine Bizette).
“This film is pure Denis, and it is richly unsettling.”
“It is macabre and dreamlike; [it] leaves behind an oily residue of unease when you have awoken from the nightmare.”