Just a day after Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher impressed audiences, Two Days, One Night has become a new frontrunner for the Palme D’Or. Brother directors Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne would make history if they won this year.
Two Days, One Night had the audience in tears, but reviewers running to write raves. The Telegraph gave the film four out of five stars, noting Marion Cotillard’s “superb” performance, which will make her the leader for the Best Actress prize at the festival.
As for the Guardian, its reviewer gave the film five stars, noting that “The Dardennes have made a brilliant social-realist drama with a real narrative tension which is something of a novelty in their work.”
The film stars Cotillard as Sandra, a mother addicted to pills and trying desperately to save her job at a factory, over the course of a single weekend. According to The Associated Press, the film starts after her boss has her co-workers vote on whether they should keep her or her colleagues will lose a 1,000 euro bonus.
“It’s a work of investigation,” Cotillard said about the film. “All the physical behavior in each of us is a way to express ourselves.”
If the Belgian auteurs win the Palme D’Or, they will become the first filmmakers to win the award three times. They won in 1999 for Rosetta and again in 2005 for The Child.