Kelly Reichardt’s Showing Up depicts the process of an artist trying to meet her deadline through a realist lens.
For this year’s competition slate, a whopping four women were competing for the Palme d’Or out of twenty-one and only two Americans as well. Kelly Reichardt, the only American woman of the slate premiered her newest and personal film, Showing Up, on the last day of the festival delivering a cool breeze amidst the warm competition slate, and came out empty handed on the awards. When a film from the US premieres at any of the big European festivals, it’s interesting to see why they chose it. It can either be an acclaimed director, a timely subject matter, or an up-and-coming filmmaker potentially breaking into the international scene. In the last ten years, only one other American woman was in the competition section (Sofia Coppola, The Beguiled, 2017) and only four other American women were selected in the ‘Un Certain Regard’ selection (Sofia Coppola, Annie Silverstein, Danielle Lessovitz, Riley Keough, and Gina Gammell). And in terms of work, Reichardt is always bringing an original and unique film that separates her from her peers. It seems that not only Kelly Reichardt is the best American female filmmaker in the past 20 years, she may be one of the best American filmmakers in the past 20 years and Showing Up is a major film in her already master oeuvre.
Opening with a somber, minutes long one-take of clay figurines by an artist, Reichardt sets the mood of a light-hearted atmosphere. We meet Lizzie (Michelle Williams), an artist working with female clay figurines on her next show with a deadline coming up. Within the first couple of minutes, Reichardt lays down the tone and type of film depicting a slice of life portrait of a minimalist artist. An anti-conventional biopic, if you call it. Lizzie is going about her day to meet her show deadline which she must complete, to finish her studies at the Oregon College of Art and Craft, but many encounters cause small distractions that add up causing frustration around Lizzie’s current state and background life.
Everything starts to go down an irritating path for Lizzie, once a pigeon gets in a scuffle with her cat and decides to leave it in her back yard. Jo (Hong Chao) her eclectic and easy-going landlord (also an artist finishing up a show) finds the pigeon and decides to care for it, but once Jo, decides her work on her show is more important adamantly asks Lizzie to care for it, passive-agressively. These little acts of agreement with others show her way of avoiding conflict, if its not needed. She’ll take the high road if it’s the little things, but knowing about her deadline, these little annoyances add up. The character behind all these nuances and nuisances constructs a complex character beneath her appearances. Many things can be thought of her from the way her character is written and portrayed, which Reichardt and regular collaborator, Jon Raymond wrote into the screenplay. Her family, divorced parents, and bipolar brother, are close with her, but in a distanced family way. Her brother (John Magaro), the biggest bother to her, is talked about as the artistic genius who hasn’t done anything yet, a counterpoint to Lizzie’s small-scale art, but yet in this film, the focus is the process of the artist.
As she delicately gets her clay figurines completed and is ready for the show, she invites everyone, her work and school colleagues, friends and family. Another brilliant and introspective subversive way is how Reichardt handles the final scenes at the art show. It can be conventional or predictive to for this set piece to have an explosive moment, but Reichardt handles it in her neo-realist, heartfelt way. The way movies are supposed to be entertaining, filled with meanings and symbolism, or even technical ways, Reichardt subverts expectation by depicting a realism that is honest and important to her, and in Showing Up, it is up to the artist, and them only, to be fulfilled by their work.
