Stars At Noon

Claire Denis returns to the haunted spaces of the postcolonial state with this coolly romantic adaptation of Denis Johnson’s 1986 novel. Trish is an American journalist running out of money and luck in Nicaragua, until she happens to meet a handsome British businessman in a crisp suit named Daniel. Instead of a louche seduction story, Denis crafts something trickier, a slow-motion folie à deux that feels exposed in the bright light of day. Daniel’s dealings (which are not as clean-cut as his manner) and Trish’s precarious existence make them vulnerable to corruption and the interference of a CIA operative. Qualley bops along as the resilient but self-destructive Trish, opposite the bemusing propriety of Alwyn’s man-with-a-secret.
Denis brings Johnson’s punkish book, which was set in 1984, into a congealed present, imbuing the story and setting with a generalized malaise and a sense that no escape is really possible, whether from anonymous hotels or the jungle and its military patrols. It’s a film that shows Denis continuing the tonal experimentation of AVEC AMOUR ET ACHARNEMENT and UN BEAU SOLEIL INTÉRIEUR in a story simmering with expat intrigue and a tragic aura. (Nicolas Rapold)

Claire Denis: CHOCOLATE (1988), NO FEAR, NO DIE (1990), I CAN’T SLEEP (1994), NÉNETTE ET BONI (1996), BEAU TRAVAIL (1999), TROUBLE EVERY DAY (2001), VENDREDI SOIR (2002), L’INTRUS (2004), 35 RHUMS (2008), WHITE MATERIAL (2009), LES SALAUDS (2013), LET THE SUNSHINE IN (2017), HIGH LIFE (2018), BOTH SIDES OF THE BLADE (2022)