Watch 35 Shots of Rum For Free

Fantastic!

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Lionel, a Parisian suburban train conductor, lives in a comfortable place with Josephine, his daughter, a university student of social studies. Their lives are examined in this introspective character study by Claire Denis, a director closely associated with the African continent. In this story, she watches a group of railway people, all of them African immigrants from the former French colonies.The focus of the film is the loving relationship between father and daughter and friends. Lionel was married to a German woman, now dead. He has reared Josephine, doing a splendid job. Even though they might not have a lot to say to one another, their love is evident. Noe, a neighbor, clearly likes Josephine. Lionel, who has been a widower for a long time, is interested in Gabrielle, a taxi driver. Nothing much happens in the story, and yet, it has its spell on viewers. One follows these immigrants who have made a life in a foreign land, living productive, if somewhat quiet lives. The atmosphere is positive as Ms. Denis decided to present them in a light which makes the audience care for them. The screenplay, written by Jan-Pol Fargeau and the director, shows their appreciation, and respect for the people being examined in the film.The cast is excellent led by Alex Descas, who plays Lionel with a quiet dignity. Lovely Mati Diop makes justice of her Josephine. Gregoire Colin plays the enigmatic Noe, and Nicole Dogue does an interesting take on Gabrielle. The production was photographed by the distinguished cinematographer Agnes Godard who bathes the film in dark tones since much of the action takes place at night. Tindersticks provide the melodious musical score.

A long, pretentious and boring mess, ending in a mushy inexplicable scene set up only to get the title worked into the film. It goes nowhere... mostly because it hardly has a plot, it is just enigmatic observations.Denis's strives for realism and humanism; but the only rare viewer can possibly identify with the film due to its purposely vague non-plot. Or to its characters who are just living their mundane lives. This film uses a manipulative narrative structure and its characters are mostly connected by lifeless staring or slight movements. The character development is nothing more than an hour and a half of watching them perform the most trivial and mundane of tasks. Nothing much happens. And the scenes in which nothing much happens drag on endlessly. This slice of life film was far less enjoyable than a slice of soggy pizza.

If like me, you're the kind of person who's desk is always tidy with everything in the right place, who appreciates clarity and structure, and is in generally on the wrong-end of the societal norm of 'just go with the flow', then this film could prove to be quite a challenge.The first few minutes encapsulate the movie in miniature. We spend the time zipping around a French metro system going nowhere in particular, via a camera attached to the front of various trains, as the timespan unfolds from daylight to darkness. This is intercut with shots of a good-looking chain-smoking bloke in his fifties, watching the subway trains from his motorbike by the side of the tracks. What is he waiting for? What does he look so worried about? Why does he eventually leave? For every answer meted out, another dozen questions take its' place.The plot, such as it is, concerns the changing relationship between a beautiful father/daughter combo (which, at times, seemed to me almost incestuous in tone), and their extended family of neighbours. Most 'stuff' is left unsaid for the viewer to interpret. Instead we are treated to languid, lingering shots of things like, er, doorways and skin. This is most definitely art-house territory, with bits of French-ness thrown in.I stayed for the Q&A after the Edinburgh Film Festival showing, in the hope that the director (Claire Denis) might shed some light on her work, and indeed she did – long, rambling answers that veered all over the place in an entirely inoffensive but generally incoherent way – just like her film really. Nice enough to look at, but not really my cup of thé au lait, even if there had been some in sulky Noe's fridge. 4/10

Alex Descas ('Late August, Early September,' 'Boarding Gate') stars with Denis perennial favorite the ('Variety'says) "sexy, soulful" Grégoire Colin; plus Mati Diop, Nicole Dogue, and Jean-Christophe Folly in a deceptively simple-seeming film about a group of apartment neighbors and coworkers, mostly black. Lionel (Descas), an RER train conductor, has raised his daughter Josephine (Diop) alone since she was a little girl. She's grown up now, a student at the faculty of anthropology who works in a music shop. They live together as a couple, each caring more for the other than for anybody else but increasingly realizing this doesn't make sense any more. Neighbor and ex-girlfriend Gabrielle (Dogue) still evidently hankers after Lionel. Noé (Colin), also down the hall, lives in the cluttered apartment of his deceased parents, goes on long rips, and hankers after Jo. They're all stuck. And all very close to each other.The engines of the plot are the retirement of one of Lionel's longtime coworkers and friends; a party; a missed concert; a bad storm; a funeral; and the death of Noé's 17-year-old cat.Denis' special touch shows in her handling of family intimacy, the way a routine event can suddenly shift into a life-changing moment. The apartment block seems ordinary and mundane but the relationships resonate from the first shots. A car that breaks down in the rain leads to a party in a closed bar with music that lights up the theater. A long stare into a woman's eyes speaks volumes. A pair are jogging on a wet day and the guy jumps in the river on a whim. His cat dies and Noé decides to move to Gabon. And an extra rice cooker taken out of its box means a new start. Almost everything is communicated with faces and very little exposition or dialogue.It's interesting how the chameleon Grégoire Colin blends in with the black people. His own face seems stained and tawny, his look gypsy-like and sly. He slips in and out of some of Denis' films almost casually, seemingly unnecessary yet essential, mysterious yet making them more real. Here he reappears at the end almost phantom-like, after he seemed to have left. Music, rain, trains, and a motorcycle become symbols of change.After the group has been established, especially the intimacy between Lionel and Jo, comes the retirement of fellow trainman René (Julieth Mars Toussaint), which leads to the "35 rum shots" evening--but Lionel stops short, saying the occasion doesn't warrant going to the whole 35. René is sad and lost without his work to define him. He speaks grimly of living to 100, but will come to a tragic end after appearing alone at a bar the group frequents and taking a sad ride in an RER engine car with Lionel.Then comes the concert, the car breakdown, and the impromptu, and wonderful, party in the bar the group persuades the owners to reopen. There are jealousies--Lionel's disapproval of Noé's intimate dancing with Jo; Gabrielle's of Lionel's dancing with the beautiful café owner (Adele Ado); but the warmth of the group is confirmed in this subtle, intense sequence.Sequences in which Jo disputes socio-political issues and Franz Fanon in a university class and is approached by fellow student Ruben (Jean-Christophe Folly) at the music shop (he invites her too late to the concert and gives her a romantic bouquet with a note) are a bit more artificial and expository but help show Jo'e developing life away from her father. There's also a trip to Germany that shows who Lionel's wife (and Jo's mother) was. But this is explanation that only shows us how much we don't know.Denis mostly, as usual, makes us do the work, but the job isn't as tricky or complicated as in her previous (and remarkable) 'The Intruder.' This film seems like the essence of what good contemporary French film-making is about: the subtle surface, the hidden depths behind ordinary appearances, the shifting amber lights in soft dawns and sunsets by Denis' consummate DP Agnes Godard; the rain, the warm café. I'm indebted to the review by 'Variety's' Jay Weisberg for pointing out that the original music is by the Tindersticks, and the enveloping song in the bar is the Commodores' "Nightshift"; and he also points wisely to the importance of Judy Shrewsbury's costume designs, which are notably lovely in the case of Adel Ado's dark red dress in the bar and the white sheath-like one worn by Mati Diop for a funeral--the occasion when Lionel finally drinks the 35 shots of rum.'35 Shots of Rum'/'35 Rhums' opens in Paris February 19, 2009; part of the Rendez-Vous with French Cinema at Lincoln Center, New York, March 2009. Raves from some of the French print sources that count most: 'Libération,' 'Le Monde,' 'Le Point,' 'Cahiers du Cinéma,' 'Les Inrockuptibles.'