MIFF NOTES: Two Days, One Night (2014, Dir. Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne)

Sandra (Marion Cotillard), a depressed factory worker spends the weekend, cloudy on Xanax, visiting her co-workers in the suburbs of Sandra to plead for their vote in a ballot scheduled for first thing Monday morning. The question at hand is whether Sandra should be kept on the payroll. The trade-off is her co-workers' €1,000 bonus.

I don't know what happened to make the Dardennes so cheerful of late. Of course, with the Belgian brothers, cheerful is relative. There is still a lot of emotional drubbing but the outlook isn't nearly as grim as their name-making efforts. Two Days, One Night shares their previous film's bright aesthetic, as well as its glimmer of horizonal hope. The Dardennes' slim premise is emboldened by Cotillard's brittle performance, one of the better encapsulations of functioning depression in recent years. Out of the repetitive, conversational narrative she pulls some moments of exceptional emotional clarity. She makes the film an easy watch even at its most difficult.

Still, despite the Dardennes' expert moral button-pressing, and the ease at which they can draw tears (always a plus for me), it is difficult to escape the fact that their target here, middle class impoverishment, doesn't carry the gravitas or the desperation of their weightier works. It is difficult to get too caught up in the fact that someone won't be able to finish their home improvement works. Perhaps, that's comment in itself.

★★★★

Trailer:

Disclaimer: Due to excessive work and excessive film going, MIFF posts are going to be pretty sketchy this year. I'll come back to some of the better ones and write them up proper-like if the mood takes.