Director Ira Sachs’ new film Passages centers on a self-absorbed film director and the love triangle he creates when he impulsively sleeps with a woman he meets at a wrap party, after which he goes home to tell his husband how exciting it was for him to be attracted to a woman.
The director, Tomas, clearly loves to have control and also loves for that control to serve his purposes, exclusively. His husband, Martin, seems to realize this about him, telling him, “This happens every time you finish a movie, you just forget,” as Tomas spins around looking for something to control after so much time intensely controlling a film set. But it does seem like something is different this time, and especially when Tomas continues to throw a lot of himself into the woman he’s met, and Martin struggles to accept what’s going on. The woman, Agathe, for her part, is enchanted by Tomas’ passion, not knowing about his destructive patterns.
But Tomas is destructive, and when he loses even a little control, like, say, when real emotions begin to creep in, he quickly turns from one of his loves to the other, hurtling between Martin and Agathe, wrecking a little part of each of them each time. It’s not obvious if he realizes what he’s doing to them, but he certainly doesn’t care, as he just wants what he wants when he wants it.
This is not necessarily a story that’s new to us, but Sachs fills the film with heat—the heat coming off Tomas, the pulsing of dance music at a night club, the raging fire below the surface that’s causing Martin and Agathe to crumble, and lots, and lots, and lots of sex. The film is an exceptional showcase for its actors: In particular, Franz Rogowski, who plays Tomas, has become an extraordinarily compelling actor, both powerful and brittle, and commanding every second of a movie that is itself powerful, painful, and complex.
Passages is available on MUBI and video on demand platforms.
