If you happen to’ve by no means identified what it’s prefer to be the one sizzling particular person in a small city, Alain Guiraudie’s “Misericordia” is right here to point out you simply that, in all its darkly comedian anguish.
The “Stranger by the Lake” director’s newest movie, which premiered on the 2024 Cannes Movie Competition earlier than touring Telluride, Toronto, and New York, will open in choose theaters on March 21. IndieWire completely broadcasts the movie’s launch from Sideshow and Janus Movies right here. “Misericordia” finds Guiraudie returning to the land of queer need, although this time with Jérémie (Félix Kysyl) coming again to his hometown to mourn the demise of his former boss. Whom he could have been in love with.
A nationwide rollout will kickoff after the movie opens at IFC Middle and Movie at Lincoln Middle in New York and the Landmark’s Nuart Theatre.
Whereas again in his hometown of Saint-Martial in rural France, Jérémie stays longer than one ought to, reconnecting together with his boss’ now-widowed spouse, and his childhood greatest buddy Vincent (Jean-Baptiste Durand). Vincent is the son of stated widow, Martine (Catherine Frot), and previous jealousies resurface, resulting in attainable homicide, as Jérémie wears out his welcome with the group. Jérémie attaches himself to an area bishop (Jacques Develay) within the course of, sending everybody, together with stated village priest, right into a psychosexual frenzy.
As Guiraudie advised IndieWire again at Cannes 2024, “Misericordia” is his “first movie with out an express lovemaking scene in a very long time.” That’s definitely one thing from the director of 2013’s “Stranger by the Lake,” the place an affair between a good-looking, sullen cruiser and a mustachioed potential killer changed into one of many sexiest, deadliest, and most express movies of the twenty first century to date. Like “Stranger by the Lake,” Guiraudie depends on his Hitchcockian arsenal of ethical ambiguity and quick-witted cuts surrounding a queer man’s harmful presence.
“On the age of 60 — effectively, I’m not fairly 60, however almost — I’d prefer to say that this movie was type of made on the energy of what I might name teenage fantasies,” Guiraudie stated through translator of his new movie “Misericordia.” “Properly, the thought of falling in love with the mom of 1’s greatest buddy or the daddy of 1’s greatest buddy. You will have this entire picture of need and eroticism as it’s linked to faith primarily based from childhood or teenagehood.”
“Misericordia” is a twisted and sordidly humorous movie to not be missed this spring. Sideshow and Janus have lately introduced movies like director Gints Zilbalodis’ animated delight “Circulation,” from Latvia, and Payal Kapadia’s “All We Think about as Gentle,” from India, to Oscar competition and stable arthouse field workplace. Look out for “Misericordia” in choose theaters on March 21.
Ari Aster, Radu Jude, Payal Kapadia, and Miguel Gomes have all praised the movie. Right here’s a extra detailed synopsis: “In ‘Misericordia,’ the entwined ambiguities of affection and demise hang-out the meandering exploits of Jérémie (Félix Kysyl), an out-of-work baker who has drifted again to his hometown after the demise of his beloved former boss. Staying lengthy after the funeral, the seemingly benign Jérémie begins to casually insinuate himself into his late mentor’s household. He lives with the kind-hearted widow (Catherine Frot) and is stalked by the venomously jealous son (Jean-Baptiste Durand), whereas constructing a wierd but significant friendship with a realistic native priest (Jacques Develay). Earlier than lengthy, small-town pleasantries are tangled into an internet of violent legal habits and erotic bodily need.”