Reading time: 3 minutes
When you try too hard to please, you often end up doing anything and denying your own identity. This is a trap that Yórgos Lánthimos did not fall into. With his cinema based on twisted parables, frontal violence and uncomfortable power games, the director has managed for fifteen years to reach an increasingly large and enthusiastic audience.
The Greek of his beginnings has given way to English, and Oscar-winning stars are jostling for position in his films (Colin Farrell, Olivia Colman, Rachel Weisz, Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Jesse Plemons, etc.). Winning awards for each new film, Yórgos Lánthimos is now the darling of film festivals.
But the filmmaker has nevertheless lost none of his satirical and uncomfortable touch. After winning the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival for Poor Creatures in 2023, the Greek returned to competition at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, with one of his most radical and unsympathetic projects. Divided into three parables about characters ready to do anything to be loved, Kinds of Kindness doesn’t care in the least about being liked. And that’s what makes him so delectable.
To abuse and be abused
Lasting 2h45, Kinds of Kindness is in fact the sum of three parts designed as medium-length films (end credits included). What they have in common is their casting (Emma Stone, Jesse Plemons, Willem Dafoe, Hong Chau, Mamoudou Athie, etc.), their dry and chilling tone, and above all, their theme: unsympathetic characters, caught in disturbing relationships of control.
The tube Sweet Dreams by Eurythmics, which plays in the first seconds of the film, is not just there to set the mood. It also reminds us that there are only two types of people here: those who want to abuse you, and those who want to be abused.
The first story follows Robert (Jesse Plemons), a man who lets a man named Raymond (Willem Dafoe) rule his every move: how to dress, what to eat, what time to make love to his wife. When the arrangement goes too far, Robert tries to rebel, and is rejected by Raymond (“if you really loved me, you would do what I asked”). But instead of emancipating himself, he realizes once left to his own devices that he would do anything to return to the comfort of his golden prison.
In the second part, Daniel (Jesse Plemons) is inconsolable after the disappearance of his wife (Emma Stone) on a scientific expedition. But when she finally reappears, he suspects her of being a usurper, and decides to reject her more and more violently. However, Liz continues to want to prove her love to him.
Finally, the third part follows two characters belonging to a polyamorous sect who drink tears (yes, summarizing a Yórgos Lánthimos film always involves a certain degree of letting go). To join this sect, Emily (Emma Stone) left behind her daughter and her husband (Joe Alwyn), whom she continues to spy on with melancholy whenever she has the opportunity. But as a dark reunion evening reveals, one relationship of control can hide another.
A cruel triptych
With each new story, punctuated by discordant piano notes, Yórgos Lánthimos pushes to the extreme the actions of characters who are each more pathetic than the last, eager to be loved and terrified of solitude. In each part, the filmmaker also captures all the little everyday kindnesses that can quickly become exasperating: showing photos of your child to someone who doesn’t care, or insisting on pleasing our guests to the point of making them uncomfortable. So many superfluous falsehoods that do not mask the ugliness of which humans are sometimes capable.
Playing a multitude of characters, all the actors give it their all and once again demonstrate their full range and their singular presence on screen. Jesse Plemons, who has an unparalleled gift for sinister and pathetic roles, won the Best Actor prize at Cannes.
Each parable in the film can evoke several contexts of domination and control: the first story, with its scripts sent every morning, can be reminiscent of a movie shoot, just like the opening of the third part, similar to an audition. We can also see it as a more contemporary warning against authoritarianism: in each segment, women are dispossessed of their reproductive rights, and their bodies are controlled, monitored and traumatized by higher authorities who say they want their good.
Whatever the case, the director delivers a rich story, made up of brilliant absurd sequences and numerous visual gags, without ever falling into simplism. The control links depicted by Kinds of Kindness are complex and intractable and, in many cases, victims also find themselves guilty of abuse or violence. This cruel and uncompromising triptych will perhaps put off some. We find his lack of false politeness rather refreshing.
