In “The Wild Boys” (2017), “After Blue Dirty Paradise” (2021), and now “She Is Conann,” it is clear that French filmmaker Bertrand Mandico has a firm commitment to poetic conversations, subversive cross-dressing, and glitter. This need not come as a shock, for Mandico has created a fantastical world which he claims is only built by these things and in “She Is Conann”, he utilizes them in the most cohesive manner making it his best film to date.
The film follows the life and love of Conan, a barbarian queen, as she is pulled into a world of violence at 15 years old (Claire Duburcq) until she reaches the height of her power as an old matriarch. As she enters new stages of life every decade, she is portrayed by a new actor, embodying her life at 25 as a brash warrior (Christa Théret), then a love-struck stuntwoman at 35 (Sandra Parfait), who gets inexplicably transported to a 1998 Bronx set, then at 45 (Agata Buzek), her most sinister age, and finally at 55 (Nathalie Richard) who turns the film on its head in the best way.
Rainer (Elina Löwensohn) is he a tribute to Fasbinder? It wouldn’t be shocking. He’s a twisted dog-faced oracle in a spiked leather coat, trying to chase after Conann her entire life, capturing her on film with his Instamatic camera while providing the film’s best quotes. (“To love the dead is to have no love lost. Oh, blessed are the necrophiles, because they are loved and have never been let down.”) Rainier plays the part of the narrator and the brute taskmaster and hauntingly reminds Conann of her pledge to barbarism that is, hatred, violence, and cruelty and also ensures that she grows when she is supposed to, and not when she wants to, which at times is equally as hard.
In this piece ‘barbarism’ has a feminine touch to it. Rainer is the sole principal male character in the film and freely cross-dresses as a woman, Mandico’s regular actor Löwensohn. It follows therefore that the same-sex love story has markers of dominance by women: one of Conann’s phases is marked by her intense love relationship with Sanja (Julia Riedler), whose name has been altered, but she’s still a redhead. But besides the referring textual lesbianism, “Conann” is much more lesbo-features than Ms Certainly, there is glitter, not to mention the sculptural skirts and tall women with bull whips all over.
Yet, the imperfection of the film’s fantastical aesthetic which is above DIY, but not quite at the polished level of a studio offers it an outsider quality which grounds it as queer art.
Anna le Mouel, who previously worked on Saint-Omer and Orlando: My Political Biography, also designed the production for this film. This was her first time working with Mandico. Mandioco worked with her closely on the production design as well. The Russian doll style of her art direction where different dolls appear in the same way she does. Their forms are outlined in furs, other parts in chains of thick huge hair all dressed up with torn fake snow and the Con and Sanja’s NYC apartment “cocaine interiors”. As does the cinematographic discourse. Witch black and white and colour constantly alternate under the decision of Mandico and Nicolas Eveilleau who takes on the cinematographer position after years of working in a certain relationship with Mandico.
The film is surprisingly brutally gory, more so than is necessary. The cinematic reality takes barbarism quite literally. Severing the bodies and pulling out their still-beating hearts to munch on. In the later part, there is a shift from the primary focus of the relief to self-referential satire where a group of art creators is offered a choice between cannibalism and poverty.
Even when rendered in black-and-white the ‘corpse’ meal looks gruesome, appearing to be made from a blend of barbacoa, tinned ham, and olives, but it is even more disgusting in color. However, the people in the movie make it look appetizing while consuming it.
Mandico’s style is exceptional, and the expectation of seeing it emerge across various films and teams indicates a very strong creative voice. It is not the most narrative or character-rich take, even here, the performers remain, for the most part, furnishings, much like the scenery which is positioned around them. But the savagery of “Conann” is what has allowed the director to actually go there and unleash a strikingly fierce, lovely Athena from his splitting head.
For more movies like She is Conann (2024) visit on 123movies
