Trouble Every Day (2001)

Director:

Claire Denis

Writers:

Claire Denis (writer)
Jean-Pol Fargeau (writer)

Release Date:

11 July 2001 (France)

Genre:

Horror | Thriller | Drama

Tagline:

The ability to love. The inability to love... The hunger to love.

Plot:

Shane and June Brown are an American couple honeymooning in Paris in an effort to nurture their new life together...

Plot Keywords:

Doctor | Medical Clinic | Hotel | Bathroom | Medicine

Awards:

2 nominations

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Vincent Gallo	...	Shane
Tricia Vessey	...	June
Béatrice Dalle	...	Coré
Alex Descas	...	Léo
Florence Loiret Caille	...	Christelle (as Florence Loiret-Caille)
Nicolas Duvauchelle	...	Erwan
Raphaël Neal	...	Ludo
José Garcia	...	Choart
Hélène Lapiower	...	Malécot
Marilu Marini	...	Friessen
Aurore Clément	...	Jeanne
Bakary Sangaré	...	Night Guard
Lionel Goldstein	...	Receptionist
Céline Samie	...	Woman in Bra
Arnaud Churin	...	Truck Driver

Also Known As:

Gargoyle (Japan: English title)

Runtime:

101 min | Argentina:102 min (Mar del Plata Film Festival)

Country:

France | Germany | Japan

Language:

French | English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital | DTS

Certification:

Hungary:18 | New Zealand:R18 | Italy:VM14 | Argentina:18 | France:-16 | Japan:R-15 | Singapore:R21 | Switzerland:18 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:18 (canton of Vaud) | UK:18 | Australia:R | Brazil:18

Company:

Arte

Trivia:

The title of this film comes from a Frank Zappa song of the same name from the album "Freak Out!"

Goofs:

Crew or equipment visible: At time-stamp 56:49, a face (presumably the crew since no one is in the house) can be seen reflected in the glass door/window on the right of the screen.

Movie Connections:

Featured in Snuff: A Documentary About Killing on Camera (2008)

Red, White and Betty Blue

Beatrice Dalle is a hypnotizing presence to me. Clair Denis has an ability to cover and penetrate the skin. She is a Jarmusch who can put his abstract angst in estrogenal terms, with as much cinematic competence. There is a tendency to compare her to Catherine Breillat. That is a mistake we guys make because both see as women. But Brellait is all about damage, the inevitability of damage. Denis on the other hand is about hope as an urge among desperate urges. They couldn't be more different.

These two women, Dalle and Denis have an understanding and make something here. It is not comfortable. For many of us, I can imagine it will be destabilizing because this really could be a deep as real pain. This is not a horror movie. It is a love story, like "Realm of the Senses," or "Pillow Book," but instead of allowing us the safety of "watching," it forces us to inhabit the fear of passion.

And. And it is from a woman who, for instance, knows that when you photograph skin, it is the movement of hair that matters, and when you get intimate, the hairs must be those finest, those ones that only a lover sees and makes move. Gallo is an intelligent actor. He is unafraid to go to these places. In a way, this is a woman's "Brown Bunny." He helps a lot. In the background are clueless beauties, men and women, who are destroyed, like the cars in an action movie's chase scene.

Dalle made this the same year she made "H Story," which I count as one of the purest of film abstractions. It worked in part because she pulled nervous sweat and menstrual blood into those abstractions. Here she does precisely the opposite. She really does need to be celebrated.

You may want the much tamer adventures in this domain: "cat People," Or even the lesser "The Hunger."

We need to have a way to indicate a commercial airliner arriving that is better than the shot used here — and 100,000 other places.

The song over the end credits is a pretty marvelous appreciation of Frank Zappa, whose earliest song provides the title. That music had the same sort of visceral, destructive purity.

Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.