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Between Rian Johnson’s “Knives Out” sequel “Glass Onion,” the terrifying quarantine “Purge” rip-off “Songbird,” and Doug Liman’s lackluster coronavirus heist movie “Locked Down.” So, movies have tried, and usually failed, to portray everyday horror and terror. The singularity of the pandemic. Indeed, turning a lack of interaction or drama into a good movie is an enviable challenge. Olivier Assayas is the latest person to recently try this, and unfortunately largely fail.
Set in April 2020, “Suspended Time” follows a disillusioned filmmaker, Paul (Vincent Macaigne), along with his wife Morganne (Nine d’Arso) and his hot-tempered younger brother Etienne (Mika Lesko), in search of his deceased parents. Etienne’s wife Carol (Nora Hamzaoui) is trapped in a picturesque country house. In the very first scene, Paul receives a radioactive Amazonian package – just a pair of socks – and a bemused Etienne asks why such a choreography is necessary. Paul explains that the virus can stay on surfaces for four hours, that people are dying all over the world, and that if it wasn’t so serious, we wouldn’t be stuck at home. These are the kind of facts we clung to for sanity during those first few months, and in this “Suspended Time” they arrive at something clear and meaningful. Our neuroses have become performance art to participate in what the world is experiencing. Being a little weird and overreacting was a counterintuitive way to connect with others and show that we care. Trust Asayas to find meaning in bulk antibacterial hand gel.
In the absence of any actual events, what follows is essentially a series of episodes illustrating the absurdity of the pandemic. Paul continues stress buying and Etienne makes more pancakes than the small factory. The brothers find themselves increasingly at odds, cleaning different areas of the house in different ways, doing everything in their power to create the illusion of control over their lives. But the whole thing has a “remember how crazy this was?” vibe. A sensibility that feels at the opposite end of the spectrum from the fertile ground for great movies.
But what’s more interesting is that Paul is experiencing what is probably his first period of mourning since losing his parents, and also the jet-setting filmmaker lifestyle that he had embraced out of a kind of emotional avoidance. That’s what I’m lamenting. He also mentions a trip to Cuba, a reference to Assayas’ 2019 Havana spy thriller The Wasp Network. Assayas’ personal intentions in his films can sometimes be exaggerated, but in “Suspended Time,” he leaves no room for misinterpretation. Paul’s last name is Assayas.
Assayas has long been the king of European meta, from high dramas like Clouds of Sils Maria to cute, small-scale works like 2018’s Nonfiction. A self-awareness pervades all his films. “Suspended Time” is the most similar of his recent films to the latter. It feels as if Assayas was created to share the ironic observations he’s collected over the years, and the lack of the larger journey of Selena (Juliet) is a bit of a drag. Binoche) appears in that movie. (It also suffers from the absence of Juliette Binoche, which is a difficulty most films have to deal with.)
During Paul and Etienne’s arguments, the women feel like background characters and don’t make much of an impression. Morgan is just a sounding board for Paul, a dainty right-hand woman who is not given the space to express her own thoughts and feelings. This may be Assayas, in his own way, trying to tell us that women don’t occupy much space in his life and don’t really challenge him. Or just a shortcut. Equally incomplete is Paul’s homage to the British painter David Hockney. His pandemic art inspired Paul to reconsider his relationship with nature and reminded him that love is all that is needed in the end. Paul expresses this idea as if it had never been said before – Morgan is always an uncritical listener – and it’s an odd note for Assayas to place so prominently. Especially since the lessons he learned about his parents seem even deeper anyway.
With narration about the importance of each room, along with memories of his parents, “Suspended Time” approaches something profound. In the absence of parents, there is a painful sense that black and white photographs of years gone by are all that is remembered. This is a clever way to share certain anxious thoughts that we have in ennui moments. But Suspended Time never really connects its two big ideas. With the daily challenges of the pandemic and the existential anxiety of what will happen behind us and what will happen after we die, it seems like we are too separate to build something bigger. I feel it. It all feels a bit more like his app’s list of notes of unrelated thoughts than a finished work that truly reflects all of his ideas, but this is something his Assayas, like a few others, That’s what we know we can do.
Part goodbye to his parents, part hello to an uncertain new era (Assayas turns 70 next year), Suspended Time is a film about admitting that we don’t actually have the answers. It is an honest expression of doubt and vulnerability by its creator. But its overreliance on pandemic rituals prevents it from fully exploring its deeper emotions, leaving it in a genre that no one seems to be able to figure out. Maybe it’s time to stop trying.
Grade: C+
“Suspended Time” premiered at the 2024 Berlin International Film Festival. We are currently looking for distribution in the United States.
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