#1344: DENIS, Claire: Chocolat (1988)

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DENIS, Claire (France)
Chocolat [1988]
Spine #1344
4K


Claire Denis immediately revealed her command of cinematic form with her debut feature, drawn from her own experience of growing up in French colonial Africa. After many years of living in France, a white woman (Mireille Perrier) returns to the town in Cameroon where she spent her childhood. There, she reflects on her past, including her relationship with Protée (Isaach de Bankolé), a Black servant with whom she formed a friendship while not fully grasping the divides that governed their worlds. Already displaying many of Denis’s artistic signatures—including an immersive sense of place; an elliptical approach to storytelling; and an interest in complex dynamics of race, sex, and power—Chocolat is an evocatively impressionistic yet piercingly precise examination of the psychology of colonialism.

104 minutes
Monaural
Color
in French
1:66:1
Criterion Release 2027

Director/Writer

Claire Denis was 42 when she directed Chocolat.
Screenplay by Denis and Jean-Pol Fargeau.

Other Denis films in the Collection:


The Film

The Extras

The Booklet

Commentary

Video tribute

Documentary 1

Documentary 2

Documentary 3

Controversial altered ending

Theatrical trailer



99

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