Blow Up My Town

1968 ‘Saute ma ville’ Directed by Chantal Akerman

A young girl shuts herself away in her apartment and goes about her business in a strange way, as she wastes the night in the kitchen – humming all along.

Chantal Akerman

13 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Willow Maclay ★★★★

In 1965 Chantal Akerman saw Pierrot Le Fou and decided that night she was going to be a filmmaker so it comes as no real surprise that her first short feels very inspired by Godard's work in the sixties. It's a little frantic in a way and Akerman almost personifies a Karina-esque character toiling away in her kitchen for the night. Where it gets a little weird and distant from those early Godard inspirations is where it takes up some of the same themes that are visible in second wave feminist filmmaking in this time period. It almost recalls Daisies brash feminism without the visual circus of Chytilova's picture. She would toil away in her kitchen, rebelling more and more…
Review by Sally Jane Black 1

CW: feminism, suicide, mental health
It's sad knowing that there are still people who would argue against this film's sentiment. Second wave defiance that eats a poor kitty along with it, a disorderly breakdown of urban European domesticity, this film gradually but not slowly, loudly but not violently peels away normality, each new chore shedding yet more reason until she is taping up the doors, no longer bearing any resemblance to household chores. This breakdown is less a depiction of mental distress and more a gob of spit in the eye of expectation, ending in darkness. My main objection is the use of the Plathian exit; it feels like a cheap shock. At its time, perhaps an opening cinematic salvo…
Review by Graham Williamson ★★★★

I'd never seen anything by Chantal Akerman before - I'd been put off by her difficult reputation, which is what happens when your signature film is nearly three and a half hours long. From what I understand of Jeanne Dielman, this twelve-minute short is an early exploration of the same idea; the use of apparently banal, unremarkable scenes from a woman's life to create a cumulative portrait of her despair.
After watching Blow Up My Town I watched this 2011 interview with Akerman. I could identify with a lot of what she said, particularly when I learned she got into film as a teenager. When you get into films as a teenager rather than a kid, your tastes follow a…
Review by Edgar Cochran ★★★★½ 4

There is a fact of utmost importance that must be addressed before stating anything: Akerman, featuring herself in her first short film as she would in many subsequent features, made this statement at the age of 18. Akerman died at the age of 65, reportedly comitting suicide. This is one of the frightening cases where the protagonist and director of a debut film, short or feature-length, announces the future death of the auteur, just like Yukio Mishima's Patriotism (1966).
Akerman is a direct product of the Nouvelle Vague. Her singing of the theme of Truffaut's feature-film debut and the editing and visual aesthetics of Godard and Truffaut are there for the opening three minutes as a homage of respect. The…
Review by eely 2

me to myself as i go about the menial tasks that make up my day-to-day life: sick chantal akerman reference
Review by Willow Maclay ★★★★

"Saute Ma Ville is the mirror image of Jeanne Dielman"
-Chantal Akerman
"In Jeanne Dielman there is a woman who lives her life through rituals. She cooks and cleans every single day. It's mechanical, perfectly shaped and fills her life with purpose. When there are slight breaks in those tasks the woman of that film begins to fracture. Jeanne Dielman shows a structure to live in. Saute Ma Ville seeks to destroy those structures."
Read the entire piece over at Curtsies and Hand Grenades
curtsiesandhandgrenades.blogspot.ca/2015/10/female-filmmaker-project-saute-ma-ville.html
Review by 🐱Andrew Chrzanowski🐱 ★★★½ 2

☆"IT'S ALL OVER!"☆
I only had time for one little film tonight. I mean that literally, just enough time for a 13-minute short and a quick write-up for now. Luckily I have one exactly that length!
It happens to be Chantal Akerman's very first work, the experimental feminist short of Saute ma ville ["Blow Up My Town"], starring herself as a young woman sick of it all. And (briefly) an adorable cat!
As the final extra on the Criterion Collection release of Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce 1080 Bruxelles, her debut film from 1968, she directs and stars in a strange picture at first glance, yet one that began a signature theme for her going forward.
Just…
Review by m. h. murray 1

this messes me up every time. i love everything about it, especially the mistakes. it feels even more poignant, and sad, now that the filmmaker has taken her own life, as she does in the piece. the film feels haunting, and yet, hopeful.
thank you for everything, chantal. i'll keep watching this little gem and telling people about it for as long as i live.
Review by Adriana Scarpin ★★★★½

Apesar deste curta ser um espelho para o Jeanne Dielmann, ele é ao mesmo tempo um igual e um oposto, especialmente porque se trata de uma jovem que dá um basta às convenções de forma anárquica que contrasta com o tipo de submissão feminina encontrada na geração anterior que é o foco da Dielmann. Em todo caso toda a revolta feminina contra o status quo vem à tona no final de forma explosiva, uma até literal.
Review by Filipe Furtado ★★★

A declaration of principles if one that still very indebt to its influences.
Review by David Espinosa ★★★★

I've been meaning to watch Chantal Akerman's first film for a while now, and I finally found it. It's interesting to see the beginning of her art, as there are things that had remained and lingered forever in her.
You can see the depression haunting every frame of her life, through her films and her characters. A futile expression of life, filled with nihilism and also death. But Chantal's cinema has also always been deeply feminist, understanding, in a sensible and particular way, how women have been subjects of oppression and mental health problems. Therefore, perhaps what struck me the most in the short film is the main character, who is practically a child, filled with innocence and playfulness, but that still chooses death. An interesting comment on mental health.
Review by katie 🐞 ★★★

Chantal, I'll totally finish that plate of spaghetti for you. 🍝
No need to waste!

Recent reviews

Review by alexhowat52 ★★★½

Wish I brave enough to make films like this at 18
Review by Dylan Leggett ★★★½

Cool if very chaotic
Review by Sloane ★★★★

Hmmmmmmmmm hmmmmmmmmmmm hmmmmmmmmmm hmmmmm bang. The shots of Chantal looking at herself in the mirror stick out to me very strongly. The disconnect of the foley/dubbing to the visuals is very compelling, the posteriority of the soundtrack makes it feel somewhat like a commentary on the visuals rather than an accompaniment.
Review by natalia

i’ve recently been feeling insecure about my lack of creative work and the nonexistent drive i have to bring my ideas to fruition. this thought has been circling around for awhile but resurfaced when my cousin told me that she remembered me directing her around when i was younger. apparently i was quite authoritative and had a concise vision in mind. i don’t remember any of it. when i tell people why i’m in film school or what got me into film i have to grasp at vague childhood memories of me avidly creating short films with my friends because that was the peak of my filmmaking. i still love film of course but i’ve been weathered down by school, mental…
Review by andrewhuot

the hummed/sung melodies throughout are fascinating and superb. the end credits a Patrice for sound, so I’m assuming that’s who performed this. great job Patrice :)
Review by RasmusS ★★★½

This is one of my favorite shorts since the period Chaplin, Keaton and such. The oddball sound design and pure energy of Akerman's performance pairs up surprisingly well with themes that mirror Jeanne Dielman. And coming down from all that energy to an even gloomier ending makes a huge effect on me. The film puts me in a complete trance for 13 minutes. It's amateur approach has a lot of charm but it's also brilliant on a thematic level. The way Akerman rebels against these chores that she only performs out of a habit or probably because she has been taught them by her mother. It's a loud and animated cry against a society that expects women to stay at home and in the kitchen, and a film that despite many stylistic differences to her later works perfectly captures what Akerman was about.
Review by Rui.x.filho ★★★★½ 3

É quase um prequel de ‘Eu, Tu, Ele, Ela’.
Review by joon ★★★½

i would be as happy as her the day i kill myself
Review by jacob i. ★★★★

Maybe one of the best and most accurate depictions of a mental breakdown I've ever seen. Fumbling around on impulse, attempting to accomplish something as simple as washing the dishes, but none of it makes any sense, and yet you continue to operate on instinct and routine, a complete loss of self. Shoe polish in place of razor blades. Fully convinced Chantal Akerman could've filmed a literal blank wall and made it captivating.
Review by Jerry McGlothlin ★★★

Feminist and LGBTQ+ icon Chantal Akerman made her film debut at only eighteen years old with Saute ma ville. Putting forth ideas that she would expand upon in Je tu il elle and eventually go on to perfect in Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles; here we see Akerman at her most primitive and radical but no less powerful or impactful. It’s 13 minutes of mindless and manic activity that culminates in an act of pure self-destruction. This bouncy short from 1968 is a display of potential and a preview of things to come from one of the most distinctly innovative and influential filmmakers of the 20th century.
Review by cat ★★★½

la la pom pom ti ta di da dam (a cappella)
Review by gucci_mango ★★

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

12 minute short with a woman performing domestic tasks in a kitchen until she commits suicide.
Reminds me of the Scorsese short where the guy shaves himself to death. That came out a year before this but I'm kinda doubting Chantal saw that.