I have a strange relationship with the French director Bruno
Dumont. He has been responsible for one of the few films in my life that I've
walked out on before the end (his 2003 feature Twentynine Palms) and I have
found none of his films entirely satisfying, but I continually find myself
drawn to them nonetheless. The weirdness of this pattern is exacerbated with
the release of Dumont's latest film Hors Satan, which is in many respects the
director's most opaque and mystifying picture to date. There is no attempt made
to explain the motivations of its characters or the often inexplicable actions
that take place within the story, and the themes of the film remain
frustratingly hard to grasp. It comes as a complete surprise, then, that I find
myself regarding Hors Satan as perhaps my favourite Bruno Dumont film yet.
Set in the barren but often starkly beautiful Nord–Pas-de-Calais,
Hors Satan is so pared down to the essential elements it doesn't even give its leading
characters names. The Guy (that's how he is credited) is a drifter who seems content to
live outside society, setting up a little campfire every night and subsiding on
handouts from people in the nearby village. One of the people who most
regularly offers him food and drink is a young woman (Alexandra Lemâtre), the
closest thing this man has to a friend. They make an odd couple. He's taciturn and possesses a thousand-yard stare that can be read in a variety
of ways, while she's a withdrawn teenage, pale and clad in black, and often squinting
as if she finds daylight too much to bear. Together they calmly trudge across
the fields, exchanging few words, and seemingly find some kind solace in
each other. The man appears to be a placid type of character, until he takes violent
retribution against those who threaten or abuse his female companion.
As well as a killer, this man is a healer, imbued with the
ability to cure ailing people seemingly through having sex with them (grubby
sex being a Dumont trademark), and to perform miracles. Dumont drops these
miracles into the film without any emphasis; they are simply another aspect of
the film that we are invited to make sense of as best we can. Is he an angel, a
devil, or both – a kind of satanic saviour? The title Hors Satan – or Outside
Satan – gives us little to go on, and Dumont has no intention of providing any
answers for his audience. His role here is to pose questions and he does it
with an obliqueness that many will find off-putting – as I often have in the
past – but in this case proves strangely compelling.
It's hard to know why this offering hooked my attention
where his previous films have failed, but maybe it has something to do with the
way Dumont uses lead actor David Dewaele, whose unusual and enigmatic screen
presence is deliberately inexpressive but consistently intriguing. There are
other virtues here too, notably the arresting widescreen cinematography
provided by Yves Cape, and a climax that is simultaneously baffling, absurd,
transcendent and satisfying. It's also open-ended enough to leave room for
possible further adventures of this mysterious loner, and for the first time in
a long time I can say I'm genuinely looking forward to seeing where Bruno
Dumont goes next.