Home
An entire household is caught in traffic thanks to the opening of a new super-highway in this satiric comedy drama from Swiss filmmaker Ursula Meier. Marthe (Isabelle Huppert) and her husband (Olivier Gourmet) live in a small home in rural France with their three children. The family values their peace and quiet, except for oldest daughter Judith (Adélaïde Leroux), who has a fondness for cranking heavy metal music as she relaxes in her lawn chair. While construction on a highway near the house began years ago, the progress has been so slow that Marthe and her family have all but forgotten about it. But once the road is opened, they're suddenly subjected to a nonstop barrage of noise, exhaust, and all the stress that comes with it, and the relative calm of the household decays into chaos as Marthe is driven to a nervous breakdown. Home was screened as part of the Critics' Week program at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival. more..
Director: Ursula Meier
Starring: Isabelle Huppert, Olivier Gourmet, Adelaide Leroux, Madeleine Budd, Kacey Mottet Klein
What happens would not make sense in many households, but in this one, it represents a certain continuity, and confirms deep currents we sensed almost from the first.
A deeply disconcerting provocation about the future of civilisation: a powerfully performed vision of an insignificant humanity.
Meier's soft touch with the offbeat material is surprisingly mature, to the point of maybe being a bit too reserved.
In this season of Hollywood blockbusters, small movies can get lost in the hype. Don't let that happen to Home.
Home is, as with so many family stories, also something of a disaster movie: the walls shudder and crack, and eventually so do the people inside them.
Ursula Meier
Bratislava International Film Festival (2008)
Best Cinematography (Meilleure photographie)
César Awards, France (2009)
Best Technical Achievement (Prix de la CST de l'Image et du Son)
Lumiere Awards, France (2009)
Agnès Godard
Mar del Plata Film Festival (2008)
Best Emerging Actor or Actress (Bestes schauspielerisches Nachwuchstalent)
Swiss Film Prize (2009)
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