Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles

Saw Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles. The title is the protagonist's name and address. This bit of information is very personal (you wouldn't give it to someone on the street) but it is not revealing at all. Who is Jeanne Dielman? The film follows her daily routine, as she makes dinner and coffee, bathes, talks to her son. This all seems very personal and revealing as well, but we don't really get to know her. She sits passively and is only summoned to life by door buzzers and kettle whistles. Until almost the end of the film, she displays all the personality of a fancy kitchen appliance. Again we ask, who is Jeanne Dielman?

I kept trying to discern if she had even a personality, hiding deep within her, or if she was really the void that she presents. Bits of her past are revealed via nightly talks with her son, but they reveal a life of further passivity. She reveals one night that she did not particularly love her husband but only married him because it seemed like the thing to do.

There's a painful scene near the end where she starts off literally staring into space but is called into action/existence by the door buzzer. It's the baby she minds for a bit each day (which she does by completely ignoring the baby in its bassinet as she makes dinner.) But, dinner made and presumably bored, she picks up the baby and tries to coddle it. As soon as she touches it, it bursts into wails. Again and again she tries and the baby just can't stand her. A failure as a baby-holder, she sits back down and stares into space again.

Two things I've not touched on yet: first is that she has a side-business of prostitution where middle-aged men discretely show up at her apartment and leave, after a while, giving her a tidy sum. I think this fits in thematically as further kinda-exploitation via her passive persona.

The other thing is that this film is incredibly slow and dull. Most of the time we are only watching a possibly-personality-less woman go about her boring routine. The flow is spiced up by domestic emergencies (a hunt for exactly the right button, over-boiled potatoes that must be replaced,) but it is testament to the tedium of this film that these count as "spice."

The question of the existence of her inner life is finally answered, at the climax of the film five minutes before the very end of it. It is a twist of sorts which is shocking and kind of vindicating. It didn't make the previous 3+ hours worth it for me. If you see this movie, see it with someone else, so you can keep each other awake! An interesting movie, but incedibly austere.