Score: 3.5/5
“Réalité” is an inside joke everyone wants to know, but the biggest joke is the movie’s lack of meaning.
“Réalité” is a surrealist-comedy directed by Quentin Dupieux (“Rubber;” “Wrong”) that will leave you questioning your own reality. It premiered in the Horizons category at the Venice International Film Festival in 2014 and had a full release in 2015.
If you’re not a die-hard film buff, you probably won’t appreciate the lack of substance that Dupieux purposely withheld in order to create this French-American absurdist film.
The film itself has a beautiful acid-washed cover that hints to a ’70s release date and a cinematic style with off-center symmetry that would drive people with OCD to the brink of insanity. The cinematography is overpowered, however, by the hard-to-follow timeline.
The story alternates between three different “realities” that carefully intertwine to create a dream-like sequence.
The first follows a young girl named Reality who finds a blue videotape in the belly of a hog her father shot. She obsesses over the contents of the tape until we find out she’s actually a young actress starring in an new film by avant-garde director, Zog.
The second storyline follows a TV actor, Dennis, played by Jon Heder (Napoleon Dynamite), who hosts a cooking show while dressed as a large rodent and battles against an invisible eczema attack.
The third, and most important, storyline is centered around Jason Tantra, played by Alain Chabat, an aspiring filmmaker who will only get his sci-fi movie produced if he can find the most guttural, Oscar-winning groan.
While the storylines already seem eccentric enough, what makes the film so absurd is the concept of reality vs. dreams. By the end of the film, the audience will have trouble deciphering what is real and what is not. The subtle humor and one-liners leave you to believe it is more than it is, but don’t bother looking for a meaning. Dupieux will have a laugh at whatever nihilist or existential theories are created.
The meaning of “Réalité’ is that is has no meaning. It is simply what has been, whether observable or comprehensible.
If you can understand the point of making a pointless movie, you’ll enjoy it. Otherwise, this is one indie film best left untouched.
Emily Brauner is 19-year-old mass communication junior from New Orleans.