52 Films by Women Vol 9. 1. La Tour de Glace (The Ice Tower) (Director: Lucile Hadžihalilović)

 

Pictured: Cristina (Marion Cotillard), the seemingly aloof 'Snow Queen' featured in co-writer-director Lucile Hadžihalilović's film, 'La Tour de Glace' ('The Ice Tower'). Still courtesy of Goodfellas (France)  

Director Lucile Hadžihalilović’s French language fourth feature, La Tour de Glace (The Ice Tower) is a film about reflective surfaces. Emotionally distanced, with spare use of dialogue, it tells the story of an orphaned young teenager, Jeanne (Clara Pacini) who becomes obsessed with a movie star, Cristina (Marion Cotillard) cast as the Snow Queen in an adaptation of a Hans Christian Anderson story. Jeanne only sees Cristina ‘in character’. The film is less about celebrity worship – Hadžihalilović eschews modern culture, setting her drama before the advent of mobile phones – and more about understanding the world with a diminished emotional and verbal vocabulary. Reality is fragmented. There is only what you can see and touch.

Modern filmmakers use gimmicks to engage an audience. Hadžihalilović frustrates our orientation from the get-go. We see a forest landscape reflected through shards of costume jewellery, or something like it. We are told at one point that there are ‘ten thousand realms.’ Details float in front of us separated by light. Actually, there is only one realm but the prism through which the action is viewed gives us the impression of multiple worlds. There is a purpose to this visual metaphor, reminding us that points of view create multiple takes on reality. Multi-polarity is a perceptual construction.

We are introduced to the film-within-a-film’s ice world early on through a mixture of fractured forest landscapes and voiceover. It is a soporific an opening as you could ever not hope to watch. I found myself, partly through mise-en-scene and circumstance, dipping in and out of sleep, further sub-dividing Hadžihalilović’s narrative shards with my own fragmentation. It is possible that such a way of experiencing a film could be intentional. A viewer could be induced to lurch in and out of consciousness as a means to make them fully aware of what they are missing. When we watch films, our brains turn still images – the proverbial twenty-four frames per second - into moving ones. What if, by technique, this process is unmade, forcing us to contemplate the gaps, turning film viewing into a two-hour video assistant referee experience. In the space between frames, did the ball hit the stumps before the player’s bat crossed the line? Is that forceful mouth-on-mouth kiss an act of love or a violation?

Jeanne lives in an orphanage, the oldest of many children. One night, she goes on a journey. She finds herself far from home and hailing down a driver. He will take her to the house near the ice rink, but first he will make a stop. Frightened, Jeanne flees the car and finds herself outside a building, which she breaks into, kicking a wooden panel at the bottom of a door, which fortunately shatters. Jeanne finds herself in a film studio, where she seeks refuge. There she will eventually meet Cristina, the woman who becomes the subject of her fascination, the object of her emotional longing. Jeanne’s feelings are as inchoate as the images that we see in the film’s opening. They represent one feeling on top of another, the yearning for unconditional love that competes with sexual desire in a never-ending spin-cycle of emotional laundry.

When her presence is discovered, Jeanne is mistaken for an extra. She tells a production assistant that she is looking for a place to sleep. The young assistant gives her a black coat to keep her warm, taking Jeanne’s red coat. The fairy tale visual frame of reference is intentional. Jeanne is the proverbial Red Riding Hood whose sexual innocence, represented by the colour red, is exchanged for black, a colour – or one could say a condition – that conceals. Just as projector light – shown when rushes are screened – represents one motif, so darkness, its opposite, is another. Many of the scenes take place at night or in places that require an artificial light source. Darkness obscures distance. It makes us easily lost or disorientated and vulnerable. However light has its own destabilising effect, blurring boundaries, evidenced in some scenes where the image is over-exposed, the background obscured. It makes us unaware of the people who can see us. Film and stage actors spend their lives standing in the light trusting their director – and themselves – that they are projecting their own best image. In one scene, Cristina watches herself in costume walking towards the camera. She doesn’t like what she sees. Her own reflection disappoints her.

Hadžihalilović shows no interest in character. The reflective surface is all. We see good and suspicious behaviour but mostly the film is about the narcissistic desire to see oneself reflected perfectly. At no point is Cristina commodified. Her figure-hugging white dress emphasises her power and confidence. We have no immediate indication as to why Cristina disapproves of her appearance on screen. There is a lack of depth to her performance – she moves through an otherwise empty space. Her objection betrays the actress’ frailty. To be a woman and to live without fear is a fantasy. Jeanne is a creature in flight; that’s what Cristina sees in herself.

Hadžihalilović operates in a world open to interpretation. As the snow queen, Cristina is projected upon as well as projecting herself. Jeanne encounters Cristina’s dress before meeting her in person. She tears off the costume diamond that is attached to the dress’ zipper. ‘I didn’t steal it, I found it,’ Jeanne declares later, by way of excuse. It speaks of a glamour that she aspires to, a hard inscrutability - a source of strength. To live without censure – that’s the dream. The opposite of the costume diamond is a set of black beads that have fallen off a necklace. We are reintroduced to these in the film’s coda.

In one of the more expansive moments, Jeanne finds a white handbag deposited by a blackbird – a magpie, perhaps. In it, she discovers a child’s identity card. Jeanne calls herself by the child’s name as a form of protection. When asked by another studio employee whether she is an extra, she replies ‘yes’ and is sent to get fitted for her costume. Dressed as a courtier, she meets ‘Queen’ Cristina.

Over the course of shooting, Jeanne is promoted to being Cristina’s stand-in. This allows her to present herself to the actress. Jeanne discovers that Cristina is an orphan, just like herself. Towards the end, Cristina gets to the point. Is Jeanne (or rather her alter ego) looking for a mother? Yes. As if to contradict herself, Jeanne kisses Cristina. It is a hard kiss, a sexual one. A hand explores. Then a push.

Before then – much before – an act of violence, Jeanne biting into the aforementioned bird, no one telling her about the dangers of eating raw avian meat. It is an articulation of her longing – repulsive but understandable.

Jeanne is treated kindly by the production. She is driven by a doctor, Max (August Diehl) to a hotel. No more sleeping at the studio. However, she is also subject to Cristina’s whims. In one scene, Cristina invites Jeanne for dinner. Waiting outside the studio, she is told that Cristina has left already. ‘She does that.’ This implies that the actress is capricious, casually cruel and acts in the moment. If Jeanne has a role in Cristina’s life it is to rid her of her narcissism.

What of the title? In fairy tales, towers function as prisons for young women, inhibitors of free will. Women are treated as prizes not as individuals. It is implied that Cristina is incarcerated by her own lack of emotion, her aloofness. As her prison is watery, she does not see it.

There is no transcendent climax to Hadžihalilović’s film. It simply ends. Dreams generally feature unfinished stories, interrupted by an alarm or some other external stimulus. We wake up, seeking to understand the narrative in which we were just immersed. So it is with The Ice Tower. I was not moved to applause, nor to condemnation either.

A note on the film’s style. Hadžihalilović uses medium and long shots to frame characters, often not cutting away in a scene. Close ups are used sparingly. Some of what we see in the film’s dramatic interludes and accompanied by voiceover appears to be filmed through a prism. There is little naturalistic sound – foley (the reproduction of natural sounds for background) is used sparingly, sometimes replaced by music. There is the suggestion of wind – an icy gust of air. Jeanne is an ambiguous central character. Her viewpoint – how she interprets what she sees – isn’t obvious. Yet she is compelled to honesty, admitting that she used a false name. She returns ‘home’ as if in a fairy tale. People are pleased to see her. Re-equilibrium is ambiguous.

Reviewed at Berlinale Palast, Berlin International Film Festival, Friday 21 February 2025, 21:45 screening