Thoughts on Personal Shopper

I watched Personal Shopper, I missed it in theaters. It’s a 2016 independent film starring Kristen Stewart as a psychic medium/personal shopper working in Paris, and trying to make contact with the spirit of her dead twin brother. I thought it was good overall, as a mix of a ghost story and a psychological thriller, and had a nice moody atmosphere to it.

Sometimes Stewart’s character bugged me, as she had a too cool for school attitude about working for a celebrity picking outfits for her, complaining that it’s bullshit and keeping her from her work. I thought, “Well, you signed up to work for a celebrity and do this fashion and entertainment stuff, don’t act like you’re above it.” Kind of similar to Stewart’s own attitude towards Hollywood/celebrity culture but still playing the game. Beyond that, she worked well with her coltish tomboy look, and seemed at ease in the film. I wouldn’t have awarded her as much prestige as the European press gave her, but it was a good performance overall.

I did like how when the film leaned into the ghost story aspect, that it managed to be suspenseful and eerie, and it had emotional resonance for Stewart’s character Maureen trying to communicate with her brother, as they had made a pact that if one dies, they would try to contact them from the afterlife. Those were some of the most meaningful parts of the film to me.

I’ve only seen a few of Oliver Assayas’ films, the others being Clean and Clouds of Sils Maria. Clean so far has been my favorite, a 2004 film in which Maggie Cheung plays a rock’n’roll widow who does time in prison for drugs, then goes to clean her life up in Paris while trying to stay sober and steady to reconnect with her daughter and in-laws. I haven’t seen it since it came out, but I remembered being really touched by it, having a lot of heart for Cheung’s character, and loving how great Nick Nolte was as her husband’s world-weary father dealing with grief for his son and caring for his granddaughter. It was just an incredible film over all.

Personal Shopper was good, but I wasn’t as blown away by it as the critical acclaim has been, I just thought it was a decent movie.