The Truth: NZIFF Review

Resting largely on a haughty performance from Catherine Deneuve, Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Paris-set follow-up to Palme d’Or winner Shoplifters is a meandering film that's about the conflict between mother and daughter.

A relaxed Juliette Binoche stars as Lumir, who returns to Paris with her actor husband (Ethan Hawke) and daughter in tow. Summoned home for the launch of the memoirs of her mother Fabienne (Deneuve), Lumir's incensed to discover her mother's made up portions of her memoir, sugarcoating it for her own image.

But while Lumir rages, Fabienne is filming a science fiction film about a mother reconnecting with her daughter after years of absences - and as Lumir sticks around, it becomes clearer that her ageing mother is in a reflective mood.

A brittle Deneuve simmers in her dismissiveness throughout Kore-eda's The Truth, a film that's as much about atmosphere as it is familial issues.

Genial to the n-th degree, The Truth wafts along on the breeze as much as the leaves do in the Paris courtyards that Kore-eda's film opens with.

It may lack the punch of a Shoplifters, but there's a pensive atmosphere throughout the Truth, and while it may feel inconsequential in the wash, the careful and precise examination of tensions throughout the years yields some impressive results.