Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles | Reel Lives
Date: 12 June 2025
Venue: Nerve Centre, 7-8 Magazine Street, Derry, Derry, BT48 6HJ
Voted Sight and Sound's Greatest Film of All Time in 2022, marking the first time a female filmmaker has taken the number one spot, Jeanne Dielman is revolutionary in its bold experimental approach to narrative subject and structure.
Chantal Akerman's landmark second feature follows the meticulous daily routine of its titular lead over the course of three days.
Charting the breakdown of its protagonist, a bourgeois Belgian housewife (Delphine Seyrig), mother and part-time sex worker over the course of three days, the film rigorously records her everyday life in extended time and hypnotic detail. To watch Jeanne Dielman is to submit to Akerman's unrelenting gaze and to be trapped with Jeanne: 'to have the physical experience of time unfolding inside you, of time entering you'.
Chantal Akerman | Belgium, France | 1975 | 201 mins | Subtitled | 15