Suspended Time (2025)

Direction: Olivier Assayas
Country: France

Olivier Assayas is no ordinary director. Irma Vep (1996), Clouds of Sils Maria (2014) and Personal Shopper (2016) are unforgettable works that remain etched in my mind. Suspended Time, however—a personal pandemic-era product—never approaches those heights.

In this uneven docu-dramedy set during Covid, the French filmmaker revisits the confinement with his brother in their childhood home in the countryside of Essonne. Vincent Macaigne plays Paul Berger—Assayas’ on-screen “double”—an anxious, neurotic filmmaker who seeks occasional relief in therapy, while Micha Lescot—carrying a Howard Stern-like arrogance— plays his rock-critic brother Etienne. 

The brothers’ tensions are tempered by their partners, Morgane (Nine d’Urso) and Carol (Nora Hamzawi), and evenings bring a temporary peace—dinners and drinks outdoors soften the edges—only for irritations to resurface the next morning. These domestic rhythms are intercut with lyrical, autobiographical voiceovers from Assayas himself.

Covid did these things, with people suddenly needing to tell a lot about themselves. Caught in the web of the past, the film struggles to move beyond the trivial, offering little more than a handful of mildly awkward domestic moments. The “artsy” dialogues, drifting toward tedium, rob the film of momentum. Suspended Time quickly goes stale—a talkative, pretentious, and overly nostalgic trifle that leaves annoyance lingering longer than any genuine insight or emotional connection.

The Lost King (2023)

Direction: Stephen Frears
Country: UK 

Although historically interesting, The Lost King is academic in many aspects, which is upsetting since it comes from Stephen Frears, an experienced director whose major works include Philomena (2013), The Queen (2006), Dirty Pretty Things (2002), and Dangerous Liaisons (1988). Stumbling in a faulty staging, this classically crafted film inspired by an incredible true story, tries too hard to please the audience, but it shrieks as it aims for that middle bar that pushes everything into comedic context. 

This is the story of Philippa Langley (Sally Hawkins), a mother of two with chronic fatigue syndrome whose determination and subjective intuition lead her to the spot where the cursed King Richard III was buried. His body had never been found since his disappearance in the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485. Guided by passion and obsession, and having fleeting dialogues with the ghost of the king (Harry Lloyd) while roaming through the streets of Edinburgh, she succeeded where many have failed.

Steve Coogan, who also stars as the protagonist’s supportive ex-husband, co-wrote this infinitely modest autobiographical drama with Jeff Pope, never missing an opportunity to adorn the situations with a dash of British humor. 

The dragging first half makes it harder for us to fully enjoy what comes next, and by the time the story reaches its climax, all my excitement has been drained away. All those cynical opportunists, tough sponsors, and difficult excavations don’t emanate enough tension, with Frears struggling to give a consistent rhythm to the storytelling as well as to find a distinctive style. One of those cases where the tedium outweighed the anticipation.