Normally I don't watch these kind of films, but they showed it at the Copenhagen Film-festival last week, and I had a hole in my schedule, so I thought "why not?" - Anyway, the story is as follows: A young woman, Lili (Julie Depardieu), is suffering from a very rare condition, where she sometimes becomes completely invisible from the world, but it happens at random, and she cannot control it herself. Therefore, she seeks help at a special institution, where a special team of specialists specifically specialize in this sort of thing. The team is led by Rose (Charlotte Rampling), who does her best to help Lili control her invisibility, and get her life back on track.
Now, what really annoyed me during the film, was that the audience never knew when Lili was invisible or not, as she is visible through most of the film, which was probably deliberate, as we were supposed to be put in her place, never knowing when invisibility would happen, and be taken by surprise. However, this also led to the idea that it was all just in her head, and that she was actually a nut-case, who was being led on by the specialists.. and what's up with having specialists for something like invisibility? Like it's something that happens all the time... I know that it's a comedy, and that unrealistic things happen now and then, but when the story is set in a realistic universe, it just seems odd that everybody just plays along with the idea that she's invisible.
There's also a lot of scenes where her dead female ancestors appear and say silly things to her, which leads to a great climax near the end, where she has to stand up for all the women in her family through the last five generations in a weird dream-sequence that doesn't feel like a dream-sequence at all.
Overall, I thought the film was very silly and confusing, but I'm sure there's a lot of feminist Francophiles who really enjoy this sort of movie. It's just not for me, even though the main character was kinda cute.
Now, what really annoyed me during the film, was that the audience never knew when Lili was invisible or not, as she is visible through most of the film, which was probably deliberate, as we were supposed to be put in her place, never knowing when invisibility would happen, and be taken by surprise. However, this also led to the idea that it was all just in her head, and that she was actually a nut-case, who was being led on by the specialists.. and what's up with having specialists for something like invisibility? Like it's something that happens all the time... I know that it's a comedy, and that unrealistic things happen now and then, but when the story is set in a realistic universe, it just seems odd that everybody just plays along with the idea that she's invisible.
There's also a lot of scenes where her dead female ancestors appear and say silly things to her, which leads to a great climax near the end, where she has to stand up for all the women in her family through the last five generations in a weird dream-sequence that doesn't feel like a dream-sequence at all.
Overall, I thought the film was very silly and confusing, but I'm sure there's a lot of feminist Francophiles who really enjoy this sort of movie. It's just not for me, even though the main character was kinda cute.
