Rent A Thousand Times Good Night (2013)

Binoche is always watchable but.. - A Thousand Times Good Night review by CE

The journalist Christina Lamb, who has worked in Afghanistan, has spoken of the same problem addressed in this film, of returning to normal life from risky assignments and of leaving your child to go to potentially dangerous places for work. A valid subject for a film then, and directed with a photographer's eye by a former photo-journalist, this should have an authentic feel, which is there in the beginning scenes but gets a little lost on the domestic front.

Approaching this film with some trepidation as I disliked Clouds of Sils Maria, I thought Juliette Binoche's performance here was much better, intense and imbuing the character with a believable combination of steel and fragility. The first and final scenes are beautifully shot and harrowing, the rest has some good moments and there is a sort of World of Interiors type of pleasure in the rather lovely homes and Irish beaches on display. Let down by dialogue such as is spoken by no real person and a contrived plot which you can spot from a mile away or at least as soon as a character says the Kenyan camps are completely safe, it could have been a much better film if the director had let up on the soft pedal and excised the scenes of too-easy reconciliation.