Rust and Bone

Rust and Bone written and directed by Jacques Audiard and staring Marion Cotillard. 

Yes this movie is French with English subtitles and if you choose to see it, see it subtitled because it’s always better to read and actually hear the actors act and this movie proves that statement with ease. This movie works on a lot of levels and is a very assured screenplay by Audiard where everything in the movie has a point. There is nothing that is shown that doesn’t play or have some effect later on. This is also one of those rare movies where the director shows a lot of things instead of telling the viewer what is going on.  But what he shows actually means something to what is going on in the movie, with the character(s), and pertains to the story line.  It's not like a lot of those pretentious arty people who think interpretation of pointless and relentless scenes of anything, but the actual story line is the only way to communicate. This movie proves those people so wrong with every frame of this film. This is one of the more reassured films I’ve seen in a long time where the writer and director (this time the same person) were very confident in the script, the story line, and the characters they had created. 

The actors here do a great job of bringing these characters to life. You actually care about them, warts and all. This movie doesn’t hide the warts.  It displays them in full force, not as some shock material, but in a real true way that’s faithful to the characters and the story line. 

 Ultimately this is a love story but a love story that has a lot of things being played around with it theme-wise, which is one of the things that made me want to see the movie. It’s a story about a guy who likes to do MMA fights, just for the fun of it, who meets a woman who got her legs amputated and is trying to put her life back together. It was this idea of a person who basically mutilates people for a living, who then meets a person who was mutilated, and the love that slowly blossoms between them that intrigued me to the story. 

 I would describe the overall style of the movie as very raw.  It appeared as if was shot on location a lot.  The characters didn’t seem to wear a lot of make-up, and the direction had a lot of hand held camera work, not the kind that ‘s annoying, but the kind that actually looks directed, but still somewhat real. All of that really added to the movie giving it a very naturalistic feel which is something Terrence Malick has been striving to do for a long time but failed miserably with every attempt he’s tried since Badlands, because he forgets that it’s people and characters who make a movie interesting. Without interesting characters a movie is nothing.  And there is nothing for the viewer to care about.  No matter how many things get blown up, no matter how many over the top action set pieces there are, no matter how much visual vomit is thrown on the screen to be interpreted, no matter how much social/political/religious/ideological commentary is thrown into the movie, if you don't have characters that are developed and that the audience will care about, everything is for nothing.  This movie never forgets about the characters.  It makes the characters interesting. It gives them history.  It gives them emotions.  It makes them work through things.  It gives them choices to make.  It lets them make bad choices and good choices.  It lets them be characters and it lets them develop.  These characters become so interesting that the last 15 minutes of the movie will be some pretty gut retching stuff at least it was for me, because honestly I didn’t know where the story line was going, with those final 15 minutes, which is something that doesn’t happen to often when I watch movies. It was good and faithful ending to the movie and this movie is well your time to see.