Proxima: Eva Green at Her Best (Review)

Elise Winokour signs an ambitious film, impressively masterful, with a deliberately feminist message.

Releasing in cinemas in late 2019, Proxima will be aired this evening on Art. First Recommend it to you, especially if you like it Eva GreenCurrently showing The Three Musketeers – Milady. Here’s our review of Elise Winokor’s film.

With each film, Alice Winokore likes to explore new territories. Their first feature, Augustine Describes the relationship between Professor Charcot and his patient, who suffered from dementia in late 19th century France. his second, MarylandA paranoid thriller centered on the relationship between a bodyguard suffering from post-traumatic stress after returning from Afghanistan and the woman he was supposed to protect.

with Proxima, the director explores the world of space conquest: an astronaut faces separation from his 8-year-old daughter before embarking on a year-long journey into Earth orbit. So many journey-like films driven by a single ambition. It evolves every time in a highly realistic environment. with Proxima

, Alice Winkor opens the doors to the facilities where European astronauts train, in Cologne, Star City near Moscow, and Baikonur. She details the meticulousness of the preparation, the precision of the training. Everything is done so that the viewer lives this experience in immersion in a world that develops its mystery to the general public. All with a realism that never stops lyricism and poetry, like Ryuichi Sakamoto (The Revenant).

Ambient misogyny
The first advantage of Proxima, is to present space travelers as ordinary people. Gone are the days of superheroes! Today’s cinema astronauts are scientists, extraordinary athletes but also human beings with their weaknesses and their emotions. Hence if the director joins the issues of recent films Ad Astra Or first manher Proxima Never mess with them.

Because its originality lies in the choice of female astronaut Sarah as the protagonist. A heroine who evolves in an essentially male professional world where her skills are constantly questioned, where she must prove more than others at every moment. The director says that being a woman astronaut means facing abuse all around, but sometimes, denying one’s femininity. Which is even more complicated when you’re a mother like Sarah. A divorced mother, without the absence of her ex-partner – quite the opposite -, often finds herself taking responsibility for her child’s daily life.

And, here again, in describing this mother-daughter relationship, Alice Winokore finds the right tone. Proxima Never seeks to glorify motherhood: the film reminds us that the child also has anxieties to calm down, a desire to manage… The succession of emotional roller coasters is tempered by the question of long separation and the potential threat of death surrounding this mission. .

The difficulty of being a woman
To play this courageous mother, the director chose Eva Green, whose haughty bearing, apparent coolness and acting, stripped of all artifice, bring depth to the story. The actress has never been so convincing. Elise Winokuer surrounds her with solid supporting roles, from which emerges impressive newcomer Zeli Boulant-Lemsle, neither model nor rebel, oscillating between the maturity of a child of divorce and the innocence of a child cradled in dreams. We come out Proxima Marked forever by the beauty of this adventure, the desire to salute all the female astronauts presented at the end with respect and the certainty of seeing a very beautiful film about the difficulty of being a woman in today’s world, beyond its subject. A feminist film, in the most delightful sense of the word.

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