Just saw the movie on cable,Mr. Scott is right, Stewart is mesmerizing,
but the rest of it was somewhat confusing, the supernatural apparitions
how many , one two three? was one after her? And the ending. Was
she in fact dead?
2
I just saw this film on cable. As a grief counselor, I saw some value in Stewart's affect. However, as usual I always disagree with Scott. I had trouble with the TV turned up load, understanding much of the dialogue (Stewart's bailiwick mumbling) and I could read much of the texts. I do not believe in the supernatural any more than a god exists, so that essence of the film was lost on me. Why have this relationship with a boyfriend if there's nothing to it? I also was disappointed in the extremely dark moments on the screen. I'd like to see the actor's working on their craft when they are frightened. I agree with a an earlier comment that the whole police thing was incomplete. It would have been a better film if it was about the lover of the film star tricking her. At least the flick would have made sense. Why the white at the ending-did she die? Thumbs down.
1
Honestly I've seen Kristen Stewart in one movie I thought she was well suited for which was when she played Joan Jett in The Runaways. Otherwise I do not get her success. She's far from beautiful and has zero screen presence. She needs to take some elocution lessons. Every movie I've seen her in she mumbles in a barely audible voice and her lines are at times very difficult to hear. There is no there there. When called upon to express emotion she can at times be convincing but the rest of her performance: well just she seems vague and slightly bored in most scenes. This film came highly recommended by a young twitter friend. It must be a generational thing. I just don't see it her popularity with the millennials.
6
Well, was she dead at the end or not?
3
Just not worth analyzing. This film has precious little to offer in the way of interpretive potential in relation to the slow, uneventful, dull pace of the movie. Stewart is a good actor - the movie filmed nicely but...nothing happens, and when what the filmmaker thinks is unfolding of plot this viewer thought it was both too slow, uninteresting and finally...b-o-r-i-n-g. Not worth one's time/rental money.
4
This is a brilliant movie: visually, aurally, and in Kristen Stewart's lovely performance. It's Jamesian in its ability to close the gap between life and death. See it for yourself.
6
Like Alicia Keys, she's got all the tools.. just not turning out any hits..... This movie did not bore me. Yet I kept waiting for something to tie it all together to make sense... the ghost, the texture, the jewelry.. the scene where the doors open by themselves....?? nothing!!!.. It was if it was written for Kristen Stewart.. she played the part well.. and the film was perhaps filmed well, it just truly never made any sense. You kept watching.... waiting............ nothing.. Ghosts,....texting......death......jewlery....... no connection. I dunno what this reviewer watched but using words like connotations of glamorous indolence, unnerving inquiry into the drift and mystery of modern life??? seriously...???? yeah none of that here... (sigh).
6
I was thoroughly taken with this film, in large part due to the compelling presence of Kristen Stewart, who is emerging as one of the finest film actresses of her generation. She seems unable to give a bad performance no matter what film she is in. The camera loves her ; she possesses a luminous beauty in tandem with genuine acting chops.
As for the film, director Oliver Assayas may have been inspired by British director Jack Clayton's 1961 horror masterpiece 'The Innocents' (based on Henry James's the Turn of the Screw'. Both films are distinguished by dark-hued cinematography and a persistent sense of dread and foreboding. 'Personal Shopper' also concerns itself with grief. The plot has elements of the gothic, communication with the dead through a medium and some Hitchcock-like suspense. To some this may seem a silly exercise to evoke several knee-jerk responses of fright in the viewer but the director and his lead actress make this a movie well worth seeing.
As for the film, director Oliver Assayas may have been inspired by British director Jack Clayton's 1961 horror masterpiece 'The Innocents' (based on Henry James's the Turn of the Screw'. Both films are distinguished by dark-hued cinematography and a persistent sense of dread and foreboding. 'Personal Shopper' also concerns itself with grief. The plot has elements of the gothic, communication with the dead through a medium and some Hitchcock-like suspense. To some this may seem a silly exercise to evoke several knee-jerk responses of fright in the viewer but the director and his lead actress make this a movie well worth seeing.
6
Honestly I've seen Kristen Stewart in one movie I thought she was well suited for which was when she played Joan Jett in The Runaways. Otherwise I do not get her success. She's far from beautiful and has zero screen presence. She needs to take some elocution lessons. Every movie I've seen her in she mumbles in a barely audible voice and her lines are at times very difficult to hear. There is no there there. When called upon to express emotion she can at times be convincing but the rest of her performance: well she just seems vague and slightly bored in most scenes. This film came highly recommended by a young twitter friend. It must be a generational thing. I just don't see her popularity with the millennials.
2
This movie is so bad one can only hope that it was intentionally so. So many funny moments. A personal favorite is when she requests Her Brother the Ghost to knock once if he's there, and to knock twice if he's not. Hahahaha. Glass drop.
7
Engaging but disappointing. This film, trying to be an arty, suspenseful, mystery failed on each count. It was well done and Stewart was excellent but the film had me wanting to burst out laughing at times, and that was not intentional.
The plot just didn't work. No investment in the mystery and the minor characters at the center of it. The so called spiritual connection with her brother never came to much, except he kept dropping glasses, making him one annoying spirt.
The texting was also annoying and the texter was never answered, and the police scene was absurd, as it was never followed up, despite a potentially incriminating fact that come to light(the jewelry).
The film had no consistency, but lots of style and absolutely no payoff. Yet good acting and directing kept it moving, unfortunately, to nowhere. I always disagree with A.O. Scott.
The plot just didn't work. No investment in the mystery and the minor characters at the center of it. The so called spiritual connection with her brother never came to much, except he kept dropping glasses, making him one annoying spirt.
The texting was also annoying and the texter was never answered, and the police scene was absurd, as it was never followed up, despite a potentially incriminating fact that come to light(the jewelry).
The film had no consistency, but lots of style and absolutely no payoff. Yet good acting and directing kept it moving, unfortunately, to nowhere. I always disagree with A.O. Scott.
9
I found the film to be boooring.
7
Unquestionably, Kirsten Stewart positions herself as our century's answer to Monica Vitti/Jeanne Moreau, a placement she had already announced in the Clouds of Sils Maria. " Victor Hugo in New Jersey" sounds like a Philip Glass opera he has yet to compose- amazingly, one of the characters in the séance looks like Abraham Lincoln, this before the publication of "Lincoln in the Bardo"!
The story about the first abstract painter/ medium is immensely fascinating, and should have had more screen time( assuming it wasn't all made up by Mr. Assayas). The movie at times seems like a long, rarified commercial for MAC and the IPhone- without the brutal murder, of course- or at least, a love letter.
What happens to all the expensive Cartier jewelry at the end?
The story about the first abstract painter/ medium is immensely fascinating, and should have had more screen time( assuming it wasn't all made up by Mr. Assayas). The movie at times seems like a long, rarified commercial for MAC and the IPhone- without the brutal murder, of course- or at least, a love letter.
What happens to all the expensive Cartier jewelry at the end?
3
Sadly, it was Victor Hugo in Jersey--the island off England.
Apple pays richly for the incessant product placements in seemingly every single film nowadays, at least I hope they do.
Apple pays richly for the incessant product placements in seemingly every single film nowadays, at least I hope they do.
2
I thought I was going to see this but product placement makes me sick to my stomach. I will not see this movie.
2
Stewart is talented - and, it would seem, naturally quiet. To me, that's alluring - in both her personality and her acting. Example: the little-seen "Camp X-Ray" (2014); she and Peyman Moaadi - often cast in director Asghar Farhadi's glories - both draw you in with an understandably quiet, tortured intensity.
Los Angeles, where I live, is teeming with over-the-top personalities - even of those not in "the industry". KS is a nice change of pace from the typical self-absorbed, emotional-vampire type of celebrity.
Naturally quiet people are largely misunderstood - and underestimated. When they've got something to say, you know it will be meaningful. When they've got a genuine calling to be an actor - as seems to be the case with Stewart - you know their performances, too, will be meaningful.
Los Angeles, where I live, is teeming with over-the-top personalities - even of those not in "the industry". KS is a nice change of pace from the typical self-absorbed, emotional-vampire type of celebrity.
Naturally quiet people are largely misunderstood - and underestimated. When they've got something to say, you know it will be meaningful. When they've got a genuine calling to be an actor - as seems to be the case with Stewart - you know their performances, too, will be meaningful.
8
I agree with you,generally, and also about Camp X-ray which I did see. And it turns out that such relationships between the guards (her role in the film) and the detainees there are not so rare and implausible as I thought. One detainee made his case for transfer with the help of one of his guards.
I Do look forward to seeing her deepen her dramatic talents in years to come.
I Do look forward to seeing her deepen her dramatic talents in years to come.
1
I wanted to like this film so much - Assayas and Stewart?! Yes, please! However, my good will progressively gave way to eye-rolling boredom. A very creaky, put pivotal, scene early on makes no dramatic sense, and then the ENDLESS cell phone use... It was like having dinner with a dear friend you haven't seen in ages, but all they do is text distractedly during dinner. I know they are ubiquitous today, but we go to the movies to get away from these devices! Even Ms. Stewart is not compelling enough to make watching her send and receive text messages entertaining. I would pass if I were you.
16
I thought that those extended scenes re cell phone use were to illustrate how separate and disconnected technology - while having solid value - has left many people feeling.
Too, the stalker/unknown caller aspect to the texting interaction was unnerving. Violence against women (also touched on in the film elsewhere) is pervasive - no wonder at times her character was terrified.
I've had some very negative fairly disturbing online / mobile phone experiences - to the point of involving the police. I'm sure this skews my viewpoint - but even if a moviegoer hasn't undergone a similar​ situation, do you really think the director would make it such a central theme so as to cause, as you put it, "eye-rolling boredom"?
Too, the stalker/unknown caller aspect to the texting interaction was unnerving. Violence against women (also touched on in the film elsewhere) is pervasive - no wonder at times her character was terrified.
I've had some very negative fairly disturbing online / mobile phone experiences - to the point of involving the police. I'm sure this skews my viewpoint - but even if a moviegoer hasn't undergone a similar​ situation, do you really think the director would make it such a central theme so as to cause, as you put it, "eye-rolling boredom"?
10
LL's review could have been written by me. I, too wanted to like this movie. Watching people text is as boring on a screen as it is in real life, regardless of the motivation or plot device it is meant to expound upon. Years ago we watched people sending emails in You've Got Mail. It didn't work then and it doesn't work now. From what I overheard from the (packed) audience when exiting, most shared this sentiment.
8
I disagree about the texting. It made sense in the young woman's life and she managed it as a with-it young sophisticate would, with aplomb -- despite the minute necessities required to negotiate, say, train travel and professional shopping. And the written dialog was rarely predictable, serving as another narrative device. Meanwhile, the character stalking Maureen via text is not known, only revealed near the end.
2
If you are a fan of watching paint dry - S-L-O-W-L-Y - or have trouble sleeping, this is DEFINITELY the movie for you! An occasional raising of hairs on the back of one's neck can't deny that this nihilistic and wholly pretentious rubbish is destined for an honorary Rotten Tomato award. Oh, and who was in charge of continuity? The end scene in the garden with Stewart is worth watching for the ever-changing hair-line below her hat!
7
People used to Hollywood blockbuster style editing may not have the patience for the more deliberate pacing of art house films, but Personal Shopper actually moved along rather briskly. Without too many long takes, the well done dialog, compelling screen presence of Stewart, and a script that builds tension progressively, the film is rarely boring. And for the record, it earned a "Certified Fresh" on Rotten Tomatoes.
3
Some screen actors are simply so interesting, luminous and mesmerising that, at least when I was young, I would watch any film they were in, no matter how small their part, again and again. Clint Eastwood is one such actor. In my view, so is Kristen Stewart.
5
Perhaps that 'elusive quality' of Kristen Stewart is something only middle-aged heterosexual men can find interesting when she is taking off her clothes?
For everyone else, she is an incredible bore on screen.
For everyone else, she is an incredible bore on screen.
7
What a nasty comment.
32
Great review, a movie we wouldn't have considered seeing but this review has convinced us.
We generally avoid reading reviews of movies we plan to see but Mr. Scott's review has convinced us this is worth our time.
We generally avoid reading reviews of movies we plan to see but Mr. Scott's review has convinced us this is worth our time.
3
Does Ms. Stewart *ever* smile?
3
Saw this today and it was worthy of a NYT Critics Pick. Kristen Stewart was entrancing! Highly recommend since it's so much more than the typical movie coming out these days.
8
I cringed through this terribly convoluted movie at last fall's NYFF. As an Assayas fan, I was mortified that he'd make such a complete and total bore of a film, with no scares, no thrills, no chills and no point; that he wanted anything to do with such a bogus script is disheartening. Stewart does well whenever she's texting or riding a Vespa (which is a lot); otherwise, this is a must-miss.
10
Yeah, that isn't a Vespa, it's a Peugeot; you know, the kind that reads "PEUGEOT" across the front? Nice try, though. You're about as good a film reviewer as you are a scooter identifier.
4
Why, as a paying subscriber, must I suffer a 2 minute long horribly low-rent commercial before being able to view the trailer?
12
i was just thinking the same thing. that girl would be shushed in certain company
3
FWIW, it allowed me to skip the commercial after about five seconds--look toward the bottom right for a message telling you you can skip it in X seconds (then click on it when it gets to 0).
1
On target review. Not an easy film to describe indeed but well worth one's time. I saw it in the NYFF and it has haunted me. Assayas/Stewart are great artistic collaborators. As a director and writer he brings out the best in his actors and actresses. Clouds of Sil Maria is one of my favorite films of the last few years.
5
thought it was incredibly well done, and modern. Loved the end making sense of the whole thing. Found her beauty a little distracting but then she is involved in that business in the film, so it makes sense.
4
some people seemed confused about the craft of acting. total transformation or disparate character roles are not the definition of skill.
While some Brits (Olivier) do try to wrap themselves in otherness- many try to find themselves in the experience of the chracter.
Authenticity & psychological coherence- a simple & true quality that is compelling- can emerge from different techinques.
Stewart may be in the Charlotte Rampling school...inner life makes all the difference...no histronics.
While some Brits (Olivier) do try to wrap themselves in otherness- many try to find themselves in the experience of the chracter.
Authenticity & psychological coherence- a simple & true quality that is compelling- can emerge from different techinques.
Stewart may be in the Charlotte Rampling school...inner life makes all the difference...no histronics.
12
I saw this at the NYFF last fall; the review is spot-on. Great performance from Stewart in a film that is "haunting" in many ways
7
Seems a fine person and a good citizen & perhaps, to some, a fascinating personality, but an actress? No. That woman cannot act.
12
great review. very perceptive. stewart is a terrific actor. i'm familiar with a number of scripts/roles in which she would shine. i hope she has a long career.
11
I have found Ms. Stewart fascinating since she appeared in Zathura as the annoyed older sister who was left to babysit her geeky brothers. She was perfect. (And she reminded me of my own teenage daughter in both appearance and personality.)
7
This review is interesting to me. I recently saw the trailer at BAM and at the end, the entire audience burst out laughing.
13
Kristen Stewart's "elusive magnetism". Elusive, indeed! I, for one, have never found it. She's been playing Bella from the "Twilight" movies in one variation or another, the endless well lit glum expression, the monotone of the line deliveries, very much this century's version of that other infuriating Hollywood creation of the previous one: Keanu Reeves.
17
Keanu? You don't know what you are talking about!!
1
It will ultimately be of interest to compare Ms. Stewart's movie career with that of Jodie Foster, another actress who got an early start in films and whose screen presence also took on a certain detachment and world-weariness once she hit her twenties and early thirties. It's funny how the gals who start early (including Liz Taylor, Diane Lane and Scarlett Johansson) seem to have longer and more productive careers than the boys who do (Leo notwithstanding).
17
Jodie Foster directed a very young Stewart in Panic Room
7
I believe Jodie played Kristen's mother, but David Fincher directed. Nice effective little thriller.
10
I had never seen any of the 'Twilight' films until recently ; only the first one but that was due to my increasing interest in Ms. Stewart as an actress. The never-ending publicity after 'Twilight' concentrated on her 'bored' look , pouty demeanor and her off-screen romance with Robert Pattinson. Well , looks can be deceiving. For the past few years Kristen Stewart has been giving quietly intense performances in good to first rate movies. She is a naturally gifted film actress who never seems to make a false movie. On screen she is magnetic and beautiful. She elevated Woody Allen's 'Cafe Society' from a standard Allen programer into a must see. She lit up the screen in every seen she was in. I think she is one of the best of the young screen actresses and can give Jennifer Lawrence a run for her money.
27
Yes but Twilight films are objectively terrible. Which you dont seem to admit....
2
See "Into The Wild". Stewart's magnetism at it's best.
13
Sounds like a perfect Kristen Stewart movie since she seems incapable of expressing emotion or exhibiting any facial expressions at all.
21
You have inadvertently put your finger on why she is a fascinating actress and a real movie star: she doesn't "act" and gesticulate all over the place. She's not a gut-spiller. But she manages to get every thought and emotion across to the viewer anyway. And Assayas is a director who understands this and uses it to superb effect, especially in this fine movie. Like many movie stars, Stewart embodies contradictions -- that pout and stubborn jaw which is so irritating to many, doesn't ultimately disguise her intense vulnerability. The impassive face is a guise to hide turbulent emotion always threatening to spin her out of control -- so she holds on more tightly, increasing the tension she creates onscreen. When she's toughest and most androgynous is exactly when she's most glamorous and erotic -- most feminine too. She's just as magnetic in jeans and leather jacket as she is in the movie star drag of her Angelina Jolie-like employer. It's a good picture. And Kristin Stewart is the real deal.
8
Was very impressed with her in "Clouds of Sils Maria." Looking forward to this.
31
Yes, Ms Stewart was the primary reason I waded through the 'Twilight' series. She, Like Emma Watson in 'Harry Potter', demonstrated that certain Je ne sais quoi in the Vampire epic that could hold ones attention (despite whatever else was happening around her on screen)....If Ms Stewart chooses her roles wisely enough, based on the roles ability to expand her as an actress, and is able to hold it together in that curious worm hole that is Hollywood, I anticipate that she will become one of the great ones.
14
Sounds fascinating...and KS does have a magnetic but quiet quality I've grown to appreciate. I'm tired of actors who project everything, over-do everything. That's been the style for so long. I want to see this.
19
It's funny. I have never found her compelling as an actress. But I might want to see this film and I can give her another chance.
13
I've not seen the film, but I've seen some of Kristen Stewart's other work. And when I read that she has "a quality of self-enclosed detachment that becomes its own peculiar form of intensity" I'm thinking that with this movie she joins a long line of other actors like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Elizabeth Taylor who are chosen to "act" only in films where they can play themselves.
12
I recommend watching Cafe society and Certain women if you want to see her not playing herself
25
Did you really put Arnold and Liz Taylor's acting abilities in the same level and category? oy vey
3
May I add John Wayne, Mel Gibson and Marilyn Monroe to your list?
1
Sounds like an enchanting film.
9
Great review. I look forward to seeing it.
13