Friday Night

MOVIE #1,143 • 🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿 • 09.08.23 𝚙𝚊𝚛𝚝 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝙲𝙻𝙰𝙸𝚁𝙴 𝙳𝙴𝙽𝙸𝚂 (𝙵𝚛𝚎𝚗𝚌𝚑: [𝚍ə𝚗𝚒];) 𝙳𝙸𝚁𝙴𝙲𝚃𝙾𝚁 𝙵𝙾𝙲𝚄𝚂 Five minutes of establishing shots to start. Paris. The big apple, baby! This feels like new territory for Denis, but almost like she’s fucking with the conventions of it? There also seems to be less going on here and that is saying something at this point. I found myself hoping this would truly be a movie about nothing in the Seinfeldian sense. But that’s selling it very short. So what’s going on? Lady gets stuck in traffic because of transit strikes. They should have called this Traffic! She picks up a stranger after hearing a radio report promoting carpools. They should have called this The Hitcher! She briefly loses her car. They should have called this Dude, Where’s My Car?! OK no more jokes.

I really enjoyed this one. The two leads and only real characters, Valérie Lemercier and Vincent Lindon, are tremendous, and it’s got a nice sad yet slyly menacing and occasionally chaotic tone. Like this tremendous speeding scene…


Look at Denis implementing some big cinema scoring and action! And there are so many odd and mesmerizing little flourishes…




It’s not that I’ve found myself surprised with every subsequent entry in the Claire Denis filmography (and what has and hasn’t connected for me), it’s the specific and varied ways in which I’ve been surprised, especially when they’re so delightful like this.

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CHRONOLOGICALLY
⫷ MOVIE #1,142 - (YOU ARE HERE) - MOVIE #1,144 ⫸

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Vendredi soir (Friday Night) is a 2002 drama film directed by Claire Denis. The screenplay was written by Claire Denis and Emmanuèle Bernheim, based upon Bernheim's novel of the same name. The film premiered at the 2002 Venice Film Festival. It was released on September 11, 2002.