On Criterion, I rewatched Clean, a 2004 drama film directed by Olivier Assayas, and co-written by Assayas, Malachy Martin, and Sarah Perry. The film stars Maggie Cheung as Emily Wang, a former MTV VJ, who is in a common-law marriage with her rock-star husband Lee (James Johnston, of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds), and they are both heroin addicts, and Lee is frustrated over the decline in his career, and Emily is seen by Lee's friends as a bad influence on him. Their young son, Jay, is being taken care of by Lee's parents Albrecht (Nick Nolte) and Rosemary (Martha Henry) in Vancouver.
After a fight in a motel in Hamilton, Canada, Emily storms off and later shoots up heroin in her car, and when she returns, she finds that Lee has died of a drug overdose, and the police find drugs in her bag and arrest her. Despite that she wasn't around when Lee died, she is largely blamed by the press for his death. She spends six months in prison, and custody of Jay was awarded to Lee's parents. Upon her release, Emily moves to Paris, but not before meeting with Albrecht, who is sympathetic to her but advises her not to see Jay for a few years while she gets her life together.
In Paris, Emily works at a Chinese restaurant owned by relatives and doesn't enjoy it, and is accused of not wanting to be around other Chinese people. She has become addicted to methadone as a way to get off of heroin, and reaches out to her old music industry friends for prescriptions for it. She doesn't relapse, but she falls into the same patterns of associating with shady people, and naively thinks that if she can get a letter to the singer Tricky through her friend, that he will help her get custody of her son. Her old friends bust into an apartment, where someone has overdosed, and rob the place of drugs before calling the police to alert them of his passing.
Albrecht, Rosemary, and Jay are in London because Rosemary is ill and needs medical treatment, and Albrecht lets Emily know and arranges for them to meet but Jay initially doesn't want to meet her because Rosemary blamed Emily for Lee's death, so Jay thinks his mother killed his father. Emily and Jay eventually meet, but it's a rocky relationship when they barely know each other and Jay is hurt and angry and confused.
Maggie Cheung is fantastic in this film, bringing a lot of heart and sympathy and understanding to Emily, and moves easily with her polyglot skills, speaking English, French, and Cantonese throughout the film.
Nick Nolte is great in this film, and plays Albrecht as a grieving old man, who has just lost his son, and may soon lose his wife, and knows he doesn't have a lot of time left (though as of this review, Nick Nolte is currently 85 years old), and wants Jay and Emily to have a connection with each other since Jay has so little family to rely on. There's a comforting warmth to his craggy voice and a knowledge that he's seen life, and wants the best for both Emily and Jay.
The film has cameos from Tricky and Emily Haines of the band Metric, and feels rooted in the early 2000s with brief mentions of Limp Bizkit and System of a Down. Béatrice Dalle has a nice supporting role as Emily's friend in Paris, and there's a subplot with Emily's former boss Irene (Jeanne Balibar) having a messy love affair with her younger assistant Sandrine (Laetitia Spigarelli) that Emily is the observant to.
It's a movie that flows without judging the characters, letting scenes play out, focusing on a complicated lead character who is grieving her husband and doesn't know what are the next steps to take to move on in her life. I like that the film ends with some ambiguity. It's not all wrapped up in a happy ending, but it's not depressing, either. She still has to work to have a relationship with her kid, to stay sober, and to have a career, and just keep going. It's a really interesting and great film, and I'm glad I revisited it.
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