Adèle Haenel

In Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), Adèle Haenel’s Héloïse watches the woman who is studying her. Haenel makes that return of attention active enough to change how we watch Noémie Merlant’s Marianne, the artist. We find ourselves looking for what each has noticed in the other, because their expressions keep affecting the exchange. Haenel gives Héloïse a will of her own without fixing her face into a permanent challenge. It is finely responsive acting, and the tenderness is all the more persuasive because neither performer insists on it.

Her breakthrough came as Floriane in Céline Sciamma’s Water Lilies (2007), beginning her collaboration with the director. Suzanne (2013) gave her a supporting role; Love at First Fight (2014) established her in comedy-drama. BPM (Beats per Minute) (2017) then placed her within an ensemble. Independent, rebellious young women recur in her work, but that description can make the acting sound more fixed than it is. With Héloïse, we are watching someone who can be affected by another person.

Sciamma’s pairing of Haenel and Merlant gives that responsiveness room to register. Marianne’s concentration makes the painting seem like work; Héloïse’s answering attention keeps her from becoming merely an object for us to inspect. We felt shy about watching them so closely, because both actors make the effort to understand one another feel private. Haenel does not need to signal a hidden meaning behind every movement of her eyes. We can follow the shifts between them without feeling that we have been set an examination.

At times, though, Sciamma makes the restraint in Portrait of a Lady on Fire feel too carefully managed. We become aware of how much attention is being asked of us, and the film could allow itself a little more ease. Haenel and Merlant earn that attention through the tenderness of their exchanges, so the reservation does little to weaken our recommendation. Begin here, with an evening quiet enough to notice what the two actors are doing.