Review: Titane

What’s the French word for shock value? Julia Ducournau’s debut feature, Raw, took the world by storm at Cannes in 2016, building a great deal of anticipation for her follow-up. Unfortunately, after another round of festival praise, by the time Titane got to me the dominant feeling as credits rolled was letdown. Raw elegantly used the genre trappings of horror to investigate the unpredictability of personality as we transition from youth into adults through cannibalism. Here, it’s obvious Ducournau is saying something about gender and identity and loss, but any thesis gets lost in chasing making the audience cringe.

A prologue quickly reveals why the film is called Titane, as Alexia narrowly survives a car accident, and winds up with a titanium plate in her head as a result. That the car accident was a result of both Alexia and her father playing a passive aggressive game is not unnoticed. Flash forward to Alexia (Agathe Rousselle), now 30, working as a model for car shows. She’s developed a star’s reputation at events, and worse, a base of fanatics that follow her after the show. One particularly daft fan tries to weasel his way into Alexia’s car, and the audience wonders if she is going to be another statistic. After a brutal death, the stalker is who winds up biting the dust. But Alexia is no avenging angel, killing indiscriminately nearly everyone around her. The ramifications of which send her into the equally odd life of firefighter Vincent (Vincent Lindon). Anything said further would spoil the intriguing and frustrating reveals that Ducournau has planned.

Select set pieces (like the dance floor tuned to Future Islands) are transfixing, but graphic violence can’t be the sole selling point. The first half is brutal, visceral, and entirely unrelated to the back half of Titane. The second half, focusing on adopting personality, and unconditional love, would have been better served by being its own film. Starting at the police station with Vincent and a bloodied Alexia gives a clearer picture of intent that an homage to Ms. 45. As the emotional relationship between the leads, the core of the picture, didn’t land for me, Titane constantly fought an uphill battle. Not for the faint of heart, give the film a chance if only for the bold swings it takes, but be warned that the whole adventure might feel more like a curio than a story.