White Material

Showed at Images 2/20/2012

Starring: Christopher Lambert, Isaach De Bankolé, Isabelle Huppert

White Material unfolds as a fever dream, a haunting, enigmatic look at the horrors of colonialism’s legacy, a subject that Denis first explored in her semiautobiographical debut feature, Chocolat (1988). Set in an unnamed African country during an unspecified time, White Material centers on Maria Vial, a coffee-plantation owner who is blindly determined to continue her business while civil war rages on around her. Chaos engulfs the nation, but Maria implores her workers, many of whom have already fled, to stay and harvest the coffee crop. Amid the increasingly violent anarchy, an injured rebel leader known only as “the Boxer” takes refuge at Maria’s farm.

  • Director: Claire Denis
  • Rating: Not Rated
  • Runtime: 1 hour 42 minutes
  • Genre: Drama

“Ms. Denis has an extraordinary gift for finding the perfect image that expresses her ideas, the cinematic equivalent of what Flaubert called le mot juste.”

– Manohla Dargis, New York Times