All hail Isabelle Huppert. Michael Haneke opted to shoot this very difficult film flatly. The subject matter could just have easily been interpreted with swirling stylization, but, visually, this looks like pre-HBO TV. (There is even a wink to this in the opening scene.) Wise choice, as it affords us all the more opportunity to let Isabelle Huppert (who I finally recognize is NOT Isabelle Adjani) do her thing. Julianne Moore so wishes she was Isabelle Huppert. But she isn’t. I don’t know of that many people who can pull a performance like this off. The story, frankly, I dunno. . .maybe I’m getting blase in my old age, but I didn’t think it was shocking enough. I mean, gasp, some people harbor violent fantasies? You do go on! What really is the message here? Who cares. What a performance.
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Jordan Hoffman is a New York-based writer and film critic working for The Guardian, Vanity Fair, Thrillist, Times of Israel, NY Daily News and elsewhere.
He is the host of ENGAGE: The Official Star Trek Podcast, a member of the New York Film Critics Circle and challenges you to a game of backgammon.