Carmen is a new film based on the famous 19th century opera by Bizet, but it is not a film of or about the opera. It has a lovely score, but not Bizet’s opera music. Plot-wise we get an updated, extremely stripped down, dreamlike story set in the Mexico/USA borderlands – a land that, although arid and largely barren is made to look spectacularly beautiful at times by the frequently stunning photography. In fact, the film is more about aesthetics and emotion than an intricate story. This also true of the opera, which has a much more involved plot but essentially is really about the music and the emotions expressed thereby.
This is the first feature-length film directed by French director Benjamin Millepied, best known until recently as a choreographer and dancer. In movie circles, he is best known for choreographing the film Black Swan (2010) starring Natalie Portman, whom he married in 2012. But before that he was a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet and a ballet choreographer creating dances for The Paris Opera Ballet and other companies. It’s no wonder then that Carmen is powered by several fantastic dance numbers, starting with a remarkable, thrillingly defiant flamenco piece by Carmen’s mother Zilah (Marino Tamayo) outside their remote ranch house in rural Mexico.
The cast is led by attractive Mexican actress Melissa Barrera as Carmen. Although known more as an actress (
In the Heights (2021),
Scream (2022) and several hit Mexican telenovelas in the 2010s), Barrera shines in a number of dance pieces with and without her costar Paul Mescal. Mescal, as far as I know, is not a dancer at all, but he is also nice to look at – and here, unlike in the dull
Aftersun (2022), he shows a quiet, vulnerable yet tough charisma. Mescal plays Aiden, an ex-Marine with PTSD, as we come to realize, who’s been hanging with his family at their Texas ranch, unwilling or unable to engage with his peers.
After the violent death of her mother, Carmen believes that her life is in danger and aims to flees Mexico, hoping to meet up with her mother’s best friend Masilda, who runs an expansive underground nightclub in L.A. Carmen gets caught crossing the border by some sadistic vigilantes and saved from rape or worse by Aiden, who intervenes with results that turn the two of them into fugitives. Once Carmen and Aiden are thrown together, love blooms as they make their way to Masilda’s.
Masilda is played by the estimable, unmistakable Rossy de Palma. Best known for her standoutperformances in several films of Pedro Amadovar, among them Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988) and Julietta (2016), de Palma puts in a real star turn here, possibly the best performance in Carmen.
Masilda receives Carmen with tears and open arms, freely providing shelter and some breathing space to the lovers. Her club provides the venue for a few more beautiful, striking dance pieces as well.
But, can Carmen and Aiden live happily ever after, with the law breathing down their necks? This is not that kind of tale.
Millepied is aided in this picture by the work of not just his actors, but a quite talented crew. There’s the cinematographer Jörg Widmere , who has worked on a number of great looking films - several with Terence Malick (A Hidden Life (2019), The Tree of Life (2011) and more) as well as others such as The Monuments Men (2014), Inglorious Basterds (2009) and V for Vendetta (2005). As I’ve said, from a visual point of view, this is a stunningly beautiful movie - thanks to Widmere. Then there is the three-time Oscar nominated composer Nicolas Britell [Don’t Look Up (2022), If Beale Street Could Talk (2018), Moonlight (2016)], whose score is a highlight, working perfectly with the look and feel of the film. And of course, there’s Millepied’s own choreography, which I found magical and romantic.
Carmen is not a picture for everybody – the absence of very much plot and its relatively slow pace and sparse dialogue assures that. But it is a strikingly lovely film that offers some tangible, almost fairytale pleasures. And it is gorgeous.
1 hour 56 minutes
Grade: B
Currently being released to select theaters in a slow roll out. Opens in the SF Bay Area on April 28, 2023 including at Landmark’s Opera Plaza. Streaming availability currently unknown.
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