Introduction
Just in time for awards season, Kristen Stewart’s directorial debut, The Chronology of Water, is releasing to limited theaters on Friday, December 5th. After making waves, pun intended, at The Cannes Festival earlier this year, American audiences will be able to dive in (also intended) to this adaptation of Lidia Yuknavitch’s lyrical memoir, along with a powerhouse performance from Imogen Poots.
Synopsis
Rather than the story of a swimmer, The Chronology of Water is the story of a writer. Lidia begins jotting down her thoughts at an early age, and that practice helps her exorcise some of her more damaging demons. It also guides her to a course taught by Ken Kesey, here played with admiration by Jim Belushi.
Here, Lidia is encouraged to embrace her voice, even as it begins to drive a wedge between her and her fellow students, who are disgusted by the brutal honesty of her writing. She becomes something of a phenom, reading for rapt audiences and watching doors swing open where she once felt confined.
By the time we finally get to know who Lidia might be, she’s deep into her villain phase. She chastises her first serious love, Phillip, literally punching him in the face for loving her. She doesn’t understand love that doesn’t hurt her or challenge her. Her older sister, Claudia (played with pouting perfection by Thora Birch), ran away from home before Lidia could follow, and she always resented her while revering her.
They reconnect later, but Lidia spins outward again. She does this without any clear indication as to when or why, thanks to the film’s adherence to a drug-addled, unreliable narration. While I’m sure this is all in keeping with Yuknavitch’s novel, it still cheats the audience out of an experience that they would want to label as a “film.”
Discussion
Imogen Poots is electric in her role as Lidia. She showcases a woman warped by what she’s known of love in her formative years into a monster of her own accord. In keeping with the mantra that “hurt people hurt people,” Lidia is thoroughly repugnant for long stretches of the film. Knowing the crucible that twisted her into this creature offers some sympathy. Yet, it doesn’t make her self-destruction, mutual destruction, and twisted version of humanity any easier to watch.
Stewart is a confident director. She eschews traditional “chronology” and structure in favor of atmosphere and viscera. Stewart is very much a “show, don’t tell” director, sometimes to the film’s detriment. She described this story as “fiercely, ragingly female,” and I couldn’t agree more. I wrote in my notes while watching that the film was “unapologetically, almost aggressively, feminist.” While this isn’t a demerit on its own, it feels like something of an overcorrection.
Further, Lidia’s journey of healing likewise shows no trackable trajectory. One morning, she simply stops hating herself so much. There is no rock bottom, no intervention, no epiphany. She just gets better. Call it a malady of moviemaking, but audiences are accustomed to a heightened reality on the big screen that makes us crave that three-act structure and all its story beats.
Speaking of big screen, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, you should see this film, if you want to, in the theater. The visuals are great. However, the sound design is terrible. In what might have been a pivotal moment toward the middle of the film, Poots whispers in voiceover. At the same time, the score shrieks some purposely, unmotivated sound. and I felt as if I was missing whatever message this meandering art film was trying to convey.
Further Analysis
To be frank, I didn’t like this movie. The first thirty minutes are hard to watch, and the score is garbage noise and strings. The frame is deliberately corroded and swimming in grain. And the lack of a timeline makes it seem more like a senior thesis than a film. It takes thirty minutes or more for The Chronology of Water to become an actual movie. Before that, it’s a choppy, unsettling montage set to sound.
The synopsis for The Chronology of Water states, “A woman becomes a competitive swimmer after surviving an abusive childhood,” which is kind of like calling Star Wars a political thriller. While the particulars of the abusive childhood are elucidated in raw, uncertain terms, and there is occasional swimming, the film is about more than that. The Lidia we meet by forty minutes in is as much a swimmer as George Carlin was a comedian.
At just over two hours, the film is an uneven watch with a largely unlikable protagonist at its center, leading to an unearned conclusion. Things turn out okay for Lidia, but the viewers are never really given a reason to celebrate this. We’re shown that she writes, but never provided any insight into its merit. She is dragged into the graduate writing program by her friend Claire (Esme Creed-Miles) and seems to succeed, through no fault (or effort) of her own. Her talent is presented as innate, so we, the viewers, can’t really learn anything from her on that front.
Conclusion
Buoyed by a transcendent performance from its lead and strong supporting performances, The Chronology of Water ultimately feels too pretentious and frankly tries too hard. To her credit, I’ve read interviews wherein Stewart discusses the film she’s made, and she’s fully aware that it is difficult. She also admits, “I never want to make the same movie twice. So whatever comes out next is going to not be anything like this.”
No one could view The Chronology of Water and accuse Kristen Stewart of being a poor director or lacking vision; that isn’t its problem. I certainly will keep an eye out for her next effort, even though I wasn’t a fan of this first film.
