Claire Denis must enjoy depicting dead-end communities. Just as her 2009 film 'White Material' portrayed the final spasms of European colonialism in Africa, the space travelers of 'High Life' have nowhere to go. On a spaceship set which resembles abandoned municipal offices, a crew of former death row prisoners have been dispatched on a mission to a black hole beyond the solar system. As their pointless journey progresses, a female medical researcher carries out perverse experiments on her shipmates until trouble breaks out among these human laboratory rats.
The story, acting, direction and production values would all be unacceptable on a micro-budget project. None of the proceedings have any rationality, even though Denis spends copious time telling her dismal tale in a fragmented narrative. To call her pacing slow would be deceptive - it's congealed slow motion. To portray the script as disjointed would be equally misleading - it's turgid gobbledygook. To describe the concept as cerebral would be outright dishonesty - it's merely vacuous pretension. Maybe Denis thinks she's concealed some profound metaphor in this fiasco, but it's just a turkey stuffed with tripe.
The story, acting, direction and production values would all be unacceptable on a micro-budget project. None of the proceedings have any rationality, even though Denis spends copious time telling her dismal tale in a fragmented narrative. To call her pacing slow would be deceptive - it's congealed slow motion. To portray the script as disjointed would be equally misleading - it's turgid gobbledygook. To describe the concept as cerebral would be outright dishonesty - it's merely vacuous pretension. Maybe Denis thinks she's concealed some profound metaphor in this fiasco, but it's just a turkey stuffed with tripe.