2 slow cinema masterworks, up close

On 'Jeanne Dielman' and 'Uncle Boonmee'

Seattle’s nonprofit film organizations have been popping off lately.

In the last week, I’ve seen two masterworks of so-called “slow cinema” with long-ass titles in a theater. One of them, Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, even played on the biggest, best non-IMAX screen in town: The former Cinerama, which was recently taken over by the Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF).

The other film, Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives, played as a pop-up event for the Grand Illusion Cinema, which was forced out of their long-time location by their landlord and is now in search of a new home.

I’ll talk about both of these films in greater detail in a second, but first, let’s go back to the concept of slow cinema.

I know to some, a film that is meditative and deliberate rather than propulsive can feel like a chore. These films are often marked by “a growing sense of alienation” that expresses resignation and exhaustion.¹

To me, these films render the everyday as surreal, unfathomable, or disquieting simply by bringing things to a crawl. At its best, slow cinema is like observing the world from a distance. Not necessarily an emotional distance, but an aesthetic one. Shots are held for long enough that your eyes and mind wander; character details, sounds, and environmental quirks accumulate and overwhelm.

If you’re reading this and are skeptical, I offer two highly venerated examples of this kind of film. One of them has even been voted The Greatest Film of All Time.²

Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du commerce, 1080 Bruxelles

Streaming on The Criterion Channel.