The white suit. When commissioner De Roller (Benoît Magimel), an official of France working in Tahiti, rides on a boat towards a surfing competition as part of his duties, he waves to a couple of people on the shore. It struck me how the white suit De Roller constantly wears in Pacifiction (2022), which seems both suave in a Bryan Ferry kind of way and also harkening back to classic French colonialism, is an iconic look. He wants to be noticed on the island, even from afar across the water. A recognisable look as he makes diplomatic rounds. Magimel is a handsome guy but he also seems a bit out to pasture, robust and slightly corpulent, which completely suits this character, continually snacking as he sits down to meetings, knocking back drinks at bars. He also continually wears tinted shades, even indoors, with an open tropical shirt, and we follow his shaded/shady perspective for the near three hour length of this languid epic.
I was compelled to watch Pacifiction after watching a few interviews with director Albert Serra and hearing about his signature approach to filmmaking. He shoots with three digital cameras for coverage, and there’s no direct communication between cast and crew. Scenes are open for actors to inhabit without hitting marks, and he even discussed how Magimel was not given the full script, and would often be fed lines through an earpiece – not so much because the actor didn’t learn his lines – but a conscious move to have the actor in a state of arrested concentration. As we observe De Roller move from night club to official meetings and receptions, eventually hearing rumours of the French government resuming nuclear testing on the island, and becoming increasingly paranoid that he is being slighted by this, past the hour mark I understood that the movie wouldn’t have any action per se, or any conventional release of tension. Everything is at a low boil as De Roller wanders the frame, often alone in a master shot. Pink hues of sunset, lush greens of the vegetation, the rolling waves of the blue water. Often tinted in post-production. A lone figure in a postcard landscape, smoothing his hair back, smiling to himself, trying to see evidence of a secret submarine through binoculars.
With French sailors congregating in a nightclub called Paradise, the staff in briefs and underwear, white cotton and silk translucent in the purple neon lights, there’s an aura of seediness in Pacification. But the film never shows anything directly, implying through sound and oblique angles. Magimel is a fantastic presence, a tour guide into powerlessness, and the foreboding vibes grow in the final act as we seem stuck in an endless night of exhaustion and suspicion. Keep the suit jacket on, mon ami, even as the sweat collects upon your forehead.
Available to stream on Mubi (US). Recommended.
VHS Tracking 