Camille Claudel (Juliette Binoche) was born in 1864. She was a sculptress and also Rodin's mistress for 15 years. She became a recluse after breaking up with him. With the death of her father in 1913, her family confines her to Montdevergues Asylum near Avignon in 1915. She is paranoid about being poisoned, fears persecution from Rodin and thinks her family is greedy for her inheritance.

There is a lot of waiting for something to happen. It's funny that Camille claims that they're trying to bore her to death. The movie gets that point across very well. Juliette Binoche is amazing. The scene where she lays out all of her persecutions to her doctor is electric. However, it's only one scene and one great actress. It's not more than that.

The clue, of course, is in the suffix appended to the name: this is, in fact, virtually a blow-by-blow of three days extracted from the 30 years, the last 30 years of her life, that Camille Claudel spent incarcerated in an asylum. Made with a touching concern for the electricity and costume bills of the producers the film defines 'austere' and even when the camera ventures outside the vast asylum building it records only lacklustre greens and browns. It could be the work of Carl Dryer, Ingemar Bergman, Robert Bresson, or even, from a later period, Eric let's-watch-some-more-paint-dry Rohmer. What it is, above all, is a Master Class in screen acting by Juliette Binoche who, for ninety per cent of the movie, has no acting competition inasmuch as, in yet another study in economy, the producers surround her with real mentally ill patients, which, of course, she towers above in the way Lemuel Gulliver towered above the Lilliputians who tied HIM down, with the only (presumably) members of Equity being the nuns who run the place, a doctor who appears as bewildered as the inmates and, in less than one reel, the brother of Camille, Paul Claudel, who, in a well-judged microcosm, proves himself as evil as both Adolf Hitler and Josef Stalin in his total annihilation of a single individual.

As you can gather it's not exactly a barrel of laffs but for students of great acting it is richly rewarding and, in its own way, as fine a movie as the previous telling of the Claudel story, featuring Isabelle Adjani and Gerard Depardieu which could, of course, by virtue of its coverage of her early life, be retitled Camille Claudel: Part One.

I wanted to leave this screening about halfway through, but not because it was a terrible film. On the contrary, it was because Dumont's impeccably observed production evokes the same sense of claustrophobia experienced by its titular character, who is yearning for release from the asylum to which she had been committed by her family.

For most of the film's duration, neither Camille nor the audience are entirely clear about why she was incarcerated, or at least, why she remains so. What little back story we are given is relayed principally by Camille herself, and in a manner that suggests more eccentricity than madness. I had not read up on Claudel prior to seeing this film, but having done so since, I absolutely endorse Dumont's rendering.

The direction is unhurried and the dialogue minimal. Long takes abound, soundtracked by repetitive noises like echoing footsteps, the crunching of gravel, and, most disconcertingly, the infantile howling of the asylum's residents. The sense of place and aesthetic is intelligently realised, and for all its oppressive qualities, this film is a beautiful thing to look at.

As Camille, Binoche shines like the genuine star she is - a genius artist playing a genius artist. The occasional closeup (and there are many) may reveal a composure running one or two shades too deep for this character, however whenever our heroine cracks, Binoche exemplifies her mastery at bridling and channeling female psychology. The other figure in the narrative equation - Camille's brother Paul - is played by Vincent in turns both tender and oblique.

Thematically, Dumont does not preach, but tantalisingly throws juxtaposition after juxtaposition before us, inviting manifold readings.

Rather than write a critical analysis here, it will suffice to say that there is much to be gleaned from this film, notwithstanding biography.

8.5/10