There are two very disturbing things about
_Titane_ which seem to have gone under the radar;
most reviewers (even the professional ones)
tend to focus on the graphic, superficial stuff.
First, the film goes along with the glorification
of serial killers rampant in cinema since _Silence
of the Lambs_ (and maybe even before that). The
scene where Alexia kills off 3 people in rapid
successful is scored to an exciting rock score,
as if we should be pulling for her. Second, it
seems to describe sexually aggressive bisexual
(or trisexual, if you count the cars) women,
especially pregnant ones, as criminally insane,
hormonal, unstable, and murderous. When she
binds her breasts, passes herself off as a
man, and partakes of the all-male ritualistic
society of firefighters, she helps save lives.
So the male hierarchy is somehow nurturing!
Lead actress Agathe Rousselle is said to be a
feminist journalist, and director Julia
Ducournau's previous film _Raw_ is, well, I
don't know how one should describe it but it
certainly doesn't have a traditional female
protagonist. But if the director were a man, we
might have had push-back against this narrative.

It is not clear why Alexia's birth parents seem
to be dismissed as unfit and disposable by the
film, while Vincent Lindon's broken-down
fire-fighter should be the revered father figure.
(Just because he is the bigger movie star?) Maybe
some day we will get interesting explanations
from Rousselle and Durcournau. For now, I think
the film confused but admire the performances
and the camera work/lighting. Claire Denis'
_High Life_ is just as graphic and explicit,
but it is an infinitely better film,
philosophically speaking.

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Bertrand Bonello plays Alexia's biological
father in _Titane_, and he seems as dis-
interested an actor as he is as the director of
_On War_. When you have charismatic actors like
Mathieu Amalric, Elina Lowensohn, Lea Seydoux,
Asia Argento, Clotilde Hesme, Guillaume
Depardieu, Laurent Lucas, Aurora Clement, etc.,
and still manage to make a tepid, dull film,
there is something really wrong with you.
Bertrand Bonello is another overrated French
director who has been put on the pedestal in
recent years for reasons that escape me. Here
Amalric's character has a mid-life, existential
crisis and goes to stay in a commune. He could
have pulled a Byron and actually gone to fight
ISIS. Or work with an NGO and help people in
poor countries. But no, he just slums around,
listens to Bob Dylan, and tries to impress us
with his "gallic cool" I suppose. Perhaps the
premise reminds me a bit of _My Dinner with
Andre_, which seemed a great film to me in my
youth; I wonder if I would still have patience
with it today. For a film about real spiritual
yearning and transformative experience, watch
Melanie Laurent's _Plonger_ instead -- now
*that* is a brave, poetic masterpiece.

(The only Bonello film of any interest I've
seen is _House of Tolerance_; Celine Salette,
Hafsia Herzi, and their fellow actresses
manage to beat the it-is-so-dull-it-must-be-art
trap.)