OCCIDENTAL WAV D: Neïl Beloufa. France. 73 min. Sep 9, 2:30 pm, AGO Sep 14, 8:15 pm, AGO Sep 16, 7 pm, AGO. Rating: NNN
A gay Italian couple (Paul Hamy and Idir Chender) check into the near-empty Hotel Occidental in Paris as political riots rage on the street outside. The manager (Anna Ivacheff) immediately senses something amiss and works to convince her complaisant staffers that the pair is neither gay nor Italian and plotting something sinister.
What is actually going on proves stubbornly subjective, as everyone formulates theories based on their own cultural biases. An installation/video artist, director Beloufa imbues the hotel’s retro decor with a conspicuous artifice that recalls Fassbinder and Schroeter (but stylized using a more of-the-moment TV aspect ratio rather than widescreen).
The luridness is amplified with jolting camerawork and broad comedy, but the explosive payoff is more cerebral than screwball. It’s all about disconnection, and there’s little humanity in Beloufa’s aggressive stylization, so despite enjoyable visual delights, Occidental doesn’t quite transcend its metaphorical echo chamber.
