PACIFICTION TBC
Paradise lost…
★★★★★ OUT 21 APRIL CINEMAS
Set in Tahiti, this sometimes cryptic, occasionally surreal and always woozily hypnotic thriller by Catalan filmmaker Albert Serra (Story of My Death, Liberty, The Death of Louis XIV) will test the patience of some. But for those attuned to its languid pacing, sun-soaked beauty and steady throb of menace, it’s a sangriaspiced fever dream that can’t be shaken off.
We follow French High Commissioner De Roller (an excellent Benoît Magimel) as he drifts through a series of meetings, encounters and parties, forever playing it relaxed and friendly but exuding smarmy colonialist entitlement as he interacts with the indigenous population. But De Roller senses the sands of this tropical paradise are shifting, and that his own power and privilege are also under threat: increasing numbers of military personnel are frequenting the sleazy nightclub run by fellow expat Morton (Sergi López), and there are rumours that the French government is set to resume the programme of nuclear testing that took place in secret from the 1960s to 1990s – sparked by possible sightings of a submarine near the island.
A geopolitical thriller that recalls Joseph Conrad, John le Carré and Graham Greene (The Quiet American particularly leaps to mind) but sways to a rhythm all of its own, Pacification also features a couple of stunning set-pieces. One unfolds in a Lynchian nightclub, the other offshore as boats transport surfers over towering breakers.