I wasn't a big fan of Paul Thomas Anderson's Phantom Thread. I know everyone else was. I've been told a few different times that I didn't get it or that I perhaps don't have the life experience to truly appreciate its ruminations on the nature of true love and fulfilling relationships. And I'm very willing to accept that there is probably truth to the latter. But I had my own problems with the way the story was told and the characters portrayed, so at least until I watch it again with said life experience, I will stand by my relatively middled opinion on it.
It seems I may have come across a similar case with Joanna Hogg's The Souvenir, and that may well be because of the similarity in their subject matter. Like Phantom Thread, The Souvenir is about an impressionable, quiet girl, Julie (Honor Swinton Byrne), who meets a more confident, pretentious, and arrogant man named Anthony (Tom Burke), and the two somewhat inexplicably fall in love with one another. The film explores the difficulties and eccentricities of their relationship, mostly brought on by their very different lifestyles—mainly Anthony's.
The film is slow—painfully slow. Now, I enjoy a contemplative movie that takes its time really digging into the meat of its characters, hanging on pretty shots of pretty people being sad—I am, no doubt, a snob. But I'd be lying if I said The Souvenir makes good use of its lackadaisical pace and deliberate slow burn tension. This slowness is made a problem by the film's habit of using its running time to continually reiterate the dysfunction and poor health of Julie's and Anthony's relationship, rather than convincing me that they were truly in love, and therefore that I should care that they're subjecting themselves to such interpersonal torture.
The performances are stellar and lived in, as Byrne and Burke both ache with unspoken resentment and uncertainty. Also stunning in a smaller role is Tilda Swinton, as Julie's neurotically conservative but nurturing mother. Also phenomenal is the film's aesthetic, which is built on cleverly unconventional camera angles and effectual jump cuts.
But beyond the beautiful visual rendering and the clear passion of the cast, I felt completely detached from the characters themselves. Perhaps it's a script issue. All time is put toward emphasizing the difficulties of the relationship, and what the couple do to stay together in spite of these, and no reason is quite given why.
As I stated before, maybe this is a case of me not getting it. Maybe I haven't been put through the ringer with someone the way these two were. Maybe I can't appreciate true, earned, hard love. But to be honest, I'm of the camp that you don't have to have lived it to empathize with it, especially in movie-watching. Too many great movies have proven that. The Souvenir just didn't do that for me.