I've Loved You So Long

When we first see Kirsten Scott-Thomas in Phillippe Claudel’s I’ve Loved You So Long, she is not the collected icon of class that we are used to. Instead she looks haggard in plain brown clothing, with drab oily hair and a face so washed-out it is almost translucent. In between cigarette puffs, she awaits the arrival of her far livelier younger sister, Lea (Elsa Zylberstein). Here, Scott-Thomas plays Juliette, who, after 15 years in prison, has been forcibly taken under Lea’s wing. The remainder of the film delicately charts Juliette’s return into the ‘real world.’ Through seemingly innocuous events such as job interviews, visits to the local pool and dinner parties hosted by her sister, we watch as Juliette struggles both with and against the pull of larger society. It is a film about growth and withdrawal, and the internal battle between these two emotions.

Scott-Thomas’s performance here is second to none; it is her ability to so completely convey that sense of pained restraint that renders this film truly remarkable. Her every look (or lack of it) is a source of great fascination, and the slow unravelling of Juliette’s personality has a quite hypnotic effect. Zylberstein works well also, as the well-intentioned if naïve sister, but she falters in some of the more intense scenes and at any rate pales besides Scott-Thomas. Claudel’s script disappoints a little at its conclusion – for a story that gains its power through its pauses and understatements, its tell-all ending feels out of place, and seems to almost cheapen the narrative. Nonetheless, this is film remains a rare experience. A definite stand-out feature from this year’s PIAF film festival, it screens at Sommerville this week and Joondalup in the next.