The storyline is tragic but light, it's the antithesis of a traditional tears-provoking heavy story. the lightness allows us to feel the intense and paradoxical personalities of cotillard, Joaquin phoenix and Jeremy Renee. Marion simply used her eyes to manifest ewa's vulnerabilities and amazing surviving tenacity, admittedly shes a timid and innocent soul with a face that's probably too beautiful for her own good but enough to save her from the borderline of deportation. The first echelon of her character is a caring sister who will sell her dignity to protect her. Then we see the stubbornness and amazing grace of her in the theater, surving among the jealousy coworkers and even maintaining her christianitybeing a prostitute. But Marion's character development is naturally not as multiple as Joaquin phoenix's. we see a self-loathing scumbag 'gentleman', who is capable of denying his own affection toward ewa to make life ahead, everything that matters seem to do with money and this is not his fault. Exteriorly hes the charming and uncanny businessman drifting between the line of legality, bribing cops to feed his exotic girls business. Interiorly he just cannot evade from his intense possessiveness and madness of ewa, he cannot stand a single moment of ewa being with Orlando, because he knows ewa would never love him back, or he is deeply diffident of his own life and line of work, hes trying but doesn't believe he can provide protection to her. He pictured his cousin, the Orlando magician a bright version of him, casually charming and easygoing, and most importantly, with an overboard career and ewa's love. Without any doubt the self-denying prolixity and growing affection of Marion makes phoenix's role more juicy and expressive and present us the luxurious outbreak(the moment he sent ewa away). With his immaculate deliverance, Bruno Weiss is alive and make us all reminiscent of somebody. The tragic story does not seem to matter that much to me, Im simply more interested in this conflicting figure. But above all, I think the most noticeable merit of this incredible film is its cinematography, every single frame is literally an oil painting with a self explanatory emotion. Sometimes is exotically vintage(scenes in theater) with this pleasant thespian old-school traits, and sometimes its dark boldness give us the synaesthesia of desolation and frigidity of 1920 new york city.in this perspective, the immigrant is an art piece, it makes those films which use background sceneries to escalate emotions and win critic's attention look like drama school boy production.
Review of The Immigrant
