★★★★
The Wait is a film by Piero Messina loosely inspired by Luigi Pirandello’s play The Life I Gave You. In Messina’s version, Juliette Binoche plays Anna, mother to Giuseppe, and Lou de Laâge plays Jeanne, Giuseppe’s lover.
Jeanne and the audience are waiting for Giuseppe to arrive, hopefully in time for Easter. Jeanne can’t get Giuseppe on the phone. Is he mad at her? Is it because of what happened last summer? Why is his mother acting so strangely?
At the beginning of the film, we meet a grieving Anna, before Jeanne unexpectedly appears. Suddenly Giuseppe is on his way, although Jeanne still can’t get him on the phone. The rest of the film is dedicated to capturing the Sicilian countryside, lakes, young Sicilian boys, and lingering shots fetishising Jeanne’s body and elevating the scenery to the pages of a glossy coffee table book.
It’s the sort of film where these shots and beautiful vistas flesh out the minimalist plot of a slow-moving story. Messina is a disciple of Paolo Sorrentino (The Great Beauty), and just like Sorrentino, Messina has elevated every shot to the realm of high art.
Leonard Cohen’s ‘Waiting For The Miracle’ completely inhabits a dancing scene between Jeanne and two young Sicilian lads she meets on the lake. “I’ve been waiting night and day / I didn’t see the time, I waited half my life away,” Cohen croons, as Messina expertly conveys the vibrancy and excitement of youth and burgeoning sexuality; an antidote to the bleakness of the plot.
The story isn’t focused on reaching a resolution, but is instead occupied with creating a visual world built on grief, betrayal and loneliness, spliced with rare scenes of human connection and fun.
The Waitopens in cinemas on Thursday June 30.
