SHE IS CONANN (2023)
Label: Altered Innocence
Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 104 Minutes 46 Seconds
Audio: French DTS-HD MA 5.1 Surround with Optional English Subtitles
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen a(2.39:1)
Director: Bertrand Mandico
Cast: Elina Löwensohn, Christa Théret, Sandra Parfait, Julia Riedler, Claire Duburcq, Agata Buzek, Nathalie Richard, Françoise Brio
In French filmmaker Bertrand Mandico's (The WIld Boys) gender and genre-bending She is Conann (2023) opens with an elderly woman (Françoise Brion, A Young Emmanuelle) wandering the afterlife with a dog-faced oracle escort, she begins to tell the story of her life, as it is show to us in flashback. This ureal odyssey is a time-jumping barbaric fantasy that moves through the different eras of her life. She is the Barbarian Queen Conann, and we start off during the Sumerian era when she is just 15 (Claire Duburcq, 1917), she sees her mother sliced in half with a broadsword by female barbarian Sanja, given the choice of joining her in the afterlife or eating her heart, choosing the latter but having her revenge by poisoning the lot of them. Every ten years or so as she enters a new barbaric phase of her life and a new actress portrays her, even changing ethnicity at one point. At 25 she is a cold-blooded warrior (Christa Théret); at 35 a stuntwoman (Sandra Parfait) in an alternate version of the 1998 Bronx who madly in love with Sanja (Julia Riedler, Luz), at 45 (Agata Buzek) a winged Nazi-esque monster who is clearly channeling The Night Porter, and at 55 (Nathalie Richard, Caché) brings things to a close in a circular way with a cannibal dinner for art-damaged hedonists. Throughout the shifting eras and different life-cycles Conann's constant companion is the dog-faced Rainer (Elina Löwensohn, Knife + Heart), a leather jacket-clad witness to her barbaric journey, whose snaps pictures of her exploits like some sort of paparazzi spirit-guide, not only witnessing her barbaric hero's' journey but influencing it, and driving her to be the most barbaric and cutthroat of the barbarians, to fine-tune her violence to perfection.
I have only ever watched Mandico's debut feature film, having somehow missed his sophomore effort After Blue (2021), but a lot of what I stylistically thought about The Wild Boys is apt here, a surreal slice of glitter infused arthouse that delights in surreal imagery and transgressive elements, though I found She is Conann to be far less abstract, but still delightfully weird, and the visual style and inventive art design is stunning. There's also quite a bit of bloody violence, we have Connan's mother bifurcated, various incarnations of Conann dispatched by her future successor selves, Conann at 45 looking very much like Charlotte Rampling from The Night Porter gunning down a Nazi conspirators in a spa, and of course the finale, a grotesque cannibal dinner. The film looks exquisite, not overly polished and still handmade, but it has an otherworldly soundstage quality to it that creates a series of unique spaces for the barbaric evolution to unfold, it's quite wonderful, the whole affair sort of having a Highlander (1986) by way of Orlando (1992), as dreamt by the cinematic-surrealist Guy Madden (Archangel) vibe about it that I was totally into.
Audio/Video: She is Conann (2023) arrives on Blu-ray from ALtered Innocence in 1080p HD widescreen in 2.39:1 widescreen. Largely a black and white affair with moments of color the image looks nicely textured, the surreal visuals are nicely rendered throughout, the film has a dreamy soft focus look to it, at times having that vaseline smeared on the lens blur to it, which can saps fine detail a bit, but the stylized look is quite effective and looks accurate to the filmmakers intentions. Audio comes by way of a French, Spanish and English language DTS-HD MA 5.1 with optional English subtitles. The track is dynamic with always intelligible dialogue
Onto the extras we get a selection of Bertrand Mandico Short Films by way of The Show Has Already Started (7:46), Rainer, A Vicious Dog in Skull Valley (26:06), We Barbarians(27:16), The Last Cartoon - Nonsense, Optimistic, Pessimistic (9:16); the 2-min Theatrical Trailer; and a selection Altered Innocence Trailers highlighting The Wild Boys (1:37), After Blue (Dirty Paradise) (1:30), The People's Joker (1:35), The Strangler (1:35). The single-disc release arrives in a clear Elite keepcase with a Double-Sided, Non Reversible Sleeve of artwork.
Special Features:
- Short Film: The Show Has Already Started (7:46)
- Short Film: Rainer, A Vicious Dog in Skull Valley (26:06)
- Short Film: We Barbarians(27:16)
- Short Film: The Last Cartoon - Nonsense, Optimistic, Pessimistic (9:16)
- Theatrical Trailer (1:37)
- Other Trailers: The Wild Boys (1:37), After Blue (Dirty Paradise) (1:30), The People's Joker (1:35), The Strangler (1:35)
- Other Trailers: The Wild Boys (1:37), After Blue (Dirty Paradise) (1:30), The People's Joker (1:35), The Strangler (1:35)
Altered Innocence Blu-ray Screenshots:
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