Palm Pictures presents an Olivier Assayas film titled Clean. Clean stars Maggie Cheung in her Cannes Film Festival Best Actress award winning role as Emily, the junkie wife of a rock star. This picture also stars Nick Nolte, Béatrice Dalle, Jeanne Balibar, Martha Henry, James Johnston, Rémi Martin, and introduces James Dennis. Clean is MPAA rated R for drug content, language and brief nudity. This film runs 111 minutes.
The wife of a has-been rock star struggles with the heroin addiction she and her husband shared. After tragedy strikes, she fights to regain her footing in life so that she can, maybe, reenter the life of her son who has lived with his father’s parents since the tragedy.
Cinematographer Eric Gautier expertly films this picture, winning the Technical Grand Prize in Cannes, 2004. The editing is very clean and, of course, the performances are very good – as mentioned above, Maggie Cheung won the Best Actress award in Cannes. Nick Nolte also gives a very strong performance in his supporting role reminding us of his real talent.
“I believe in forgiveness, people change. If they need to, they change.” Albrecht (Nick Nolte) shares this nugget of wisdom with Emily right about the time in the film when the character development begins to kick in and pay off. Before this point, I was somewhat apathetic towards Emily. We see her make mistake after mistake and wonder how she managed to successfully have a child in the first place.
Albrecht’s statement is in stark contrast to that of Irene (Jeanne Balibar) who, having known Emily for years, says “I’ve heard all your lies… People don’t change”. But the audience knows that there is at least some truth in what Emily is telling Irene. As the story proceeds, we see that Emily’s desire to be with her son is changing her.
As Albrecht tells of his faith in forgiveness, he also admits that he has a motive for meeting Emily and arranging for her to meet her son. Emily understands his situation and makes some good decisions related to seeing her boy and keeping some promises to Albrecht.
In the end, there is a redemption of sorts. Some of Emily’s more recent good decisions pay off and while we do not see everything happen, the film closes with the satisfaction of knowing that things are going to work out after all. Please note this praise – there are no other films referenced in this review – this film is a strong and unique work. While fiction, Clean is a refreshing and hopeful look at someone making a change for the better and for the future.