I've Loved You So Long: Movie, DVD Review (2009)

Written and directed by Philippe Claudel, 117 minutes, rated PG-13. In French with English subtitles.

Philippe Claudel’s “I’ve Loved You So Long” finds Kristen Scott Thomas giving one of last year’s best performances in one of last year’s better films.

Released at the start of the awards season, where it created some early buzz before losing ground and fading away, the movie now can be seen on DVD, which remains that great equalizer for those who want access to movies that go beyond, say, this weekend’s wide releases of the raunch comedy “Miss March,” the horror remake of “The Last House on the Left” and Disney’s “Race to Witch Mountain.”

“I’ve Loved You So Long” doesn’t have their budgets or their marketing heft, but it’s a terrific foreign film and it deserves to be seen.

The movie is the story of two sisters--elder Juliette (Scott Thomas) and younger Lea (Elsa Zylberstein)--who come to know each other again after a 15-year absence.

What drew them apart? That would be prison, where Juliette stayed after committing a murder that’s so divisive, her presence causes immediate tension between Lea and her husband, Luc (Serge Hazanavicius), when Juliette moves in to live with them. There, along with Lea and Luc’s two adopted daughters and Luc’s father (Jean-Claude Arnaud, excellent), who suffered a stroke and cannot speak, they are forced to work through a conflict that is so tense, it might just sink their marriage.

In spite of what her sister did (the movie reveals who she murdered gradually, powerfully), Lea is determined to put the past in the past--she loves her sister and wants to move forward into this new relationship with her.

Luc isn’t quite as forgiving, particularly since he now has to contend with a convicted murderer living in his house. Who is this woman, anyway? Would she kill his two daughters? Would she kill his wife, his father, perhaps even him? Who knows? Certainly not Luc, who hasn’t met Juliette until now, and so his worries brew.

About Juliette--she certainly is a mystery, that one. Cloaked in a pallor of regret, rage, misgivings, hurt and a wealth of other emotions you can’t put your finger on because Scott Thomas allows no one to come too close, her Juliette doesn’t say much, but her face speaks volumes. And that’s the greatness behind her performance--the seamless way she at once conceals the truth and fiercely embraces it. That sounds like a contradiction, but here it makes for a complex, satisfying character study.

This is a movie concerned with a woman in transition. Who is Juliette if she doesn’t reveal the truth of her crime to those who wish to be closer to her? And who is she if she does spill the goods? Director Claudel, who is best known as a novelist, keeps his eye trained on that one core question, carrying it through wakes of light and darkness to an ending that’s just as deservedly explosive--and as cathartic--as it has to be.

Grade: A-