‎Je, Tu, Il, Elle (1974) directed by Chantal Akerman • Reviews, film + cast • Letterboxd

Je, Tu, Il, Elle

1974 Directed by Chantal Akerman

'Je' is a girl voluntarily lock up in a room. 'Tu' is the script. 'Il' is a lorry driver. 'Elle' is the girlfriend.

For more than a month, eating only powdered sugar, a woman tries to deal with a breakup: she paints her room twice, removes the furniture, writes and rewrites a letter to her lover, clarifying all she had said. She spreads the pages on the floor. She lies down and waits. Finally, her sugar eaten, she is hungry and leaves. She flags down a truck; she and the trucker drive through the dark, stopping at a diner and bars. He asks for a hand job, she complies. He talks about his wife, children, and sex life. She arrives at the flat of her lover, a woman, who tells her she cannot stay. She says she is hungry, so her lover feeds her then allows her to stay the night. They make love.

Chantal Akerman Niels Arestrup Claire Wauthion

86 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Sally Jane Black 1

It takes a moment to realize that, yes, she's eating sugar straight out of a brown paper bag. What at first seems like it's going to just be an interesting study of a human being and her emotional inner monologue turns into a strange journey through baser emotions. I can only assume the... raw eating habit is indicative of some sort of basic craving. She's ingesting pure energy, something sweet but not complex. It's not necessarily about need, but want.

Perhaps because of the focus on food throughout the film, especially the sugar and the neat way Julie's ex-girlfriend folds up the sandwich she creates, the climactic sex scene of this film reminded me of a more direct, slower Svankmajer.…
Review by Diogo Serafim ★★★★ 4

the images soon catch up with the narrative, but the diegesis remains enigmatic. akerman works with an approach towards non-solidity, images may fade or resist, transitions may be abrupt, but the movie structures itself in some kind of watery resistance nonetheless: what we see resists that which we perceive and vice-versa.

there is some perverse causality within the dissembling black & white and the sudden shifts of light: the anguish is palpable, but we can't fully grasp it. the entire film constructs itself within some ilusory sense of compactness, of impenetrability, as if chantal wanted to hide her pain by showing only a glimpse of it.

"i realised that life stood still no matter what, that nothing would happen, and that i had to wait until it stopped snowing and the snow melted. it snowed a long time."

the last scene tranfigures love as rage, and when it's over, she leaves once more.
Review by Serafina ★★★★ 1

Unlike any film I've ever seen, and a supremely raw display of human experience.

There's a book I've read that discusses emotions in relation to the consumption of different foods, and it explains that excessive sugar bespeaks an inner desire for love and affection. I kept thinking about that description throughout the early parts of this narrative as the protagonist sits in her lonely room ruminating over lost love and subsisting on empty sweetness.

Admittedly, it was just slightly unsettling how much I could relate to her. There was a moment in the truck where the man said, "You obey, but you're afraid. You think it's wrong." That phrase seemed as though it could be an overarching metaphor for women…
Review by James Healey 6

My friend told me there was a 15 minute lesbian sex scene at the end of this so I decided to check it out (the scene, not the entire film). Half of it was pretty much just naked wrestling. I think I'll stick to Blue is the Warmest Color for my art house porn.
Review by Edgar Cochran ★★★★★ 3

-Who am I? I'm a woman expecting for the inevitable, the irreversible to be erased, like a miracle that could only happen in an alternate reality, a reality that might bring me gloves when I'm in cold, or an embrace when solitude haunts me, or the concrete to seal up my heart wounds. Who are you?
-I am the one that reveals the truth, that understands your motives even better than yourself. I am the one that nudes what happens behind the curtain. I am the prophet of future consequences, and what lies beyond your destiny.
-Who is he?
-He's the typical incarnation of chauvinism, an existentialist entity of a monotonous existence, if you like to put it that way,…
Review by Milez Das ★★★★★ 2

Before I proceed to my thoughts on this movie, I want to thank Edgar for his review on this incredible movie that made me step into the world of Chantel Akerman...

The movie starts with a woman who is all alone with in an apartment with a bed, her bag of sugar and few things... She is struggling with a break up, she is writing letters, same words trying to figure out. Roaming her apartment, lying naked and eating sugar and nothing else.

She gets out finally, a truck driver giver her lift. They make stops to eat and here is a journey of the truck driver, alone driving. Married, talking about his sex life. How he needs a release,…

Recent reviews

Review by Nick Bernier ★★★★

Akerman is one of the most nakedly open artists in all of cinema. This film is beautiful and raw. Amazing debut.
Review by David_Bautista ★

1
Review by Clarence Cabanero ★★★

Slow-burn, deliberate, and very much of style with Akerman's work. It's an interesting debut and you can see how it develops into her magnificent Jeanne Dielman, but this one lacks the rigor of that one. Also, a slog to get through even at 1 hr and 25 mins, entirely because it's not as hypnotic as her masterwork. B-
Review by Ugne ★★★½

So Frenchy in the very best way.
Review by luiza

the way akerman portrays loneliness (and heartbreak) is just..... wow. there is no film like this
Review by Jennifer ★★★½

Being so heartbroken over a girl you get rid of all the furniture in your apartment because it reminds you of her and just sulk in bed for a month writing her letters and eating only sugar: Low key relatable.

This film is so incredibly personal, raw, and uninhibited that I can't help being drawn to and impressed by it in spite of its strangeness and deliberately slow pace.
Review by Paula Castro ★★½

ok but this letterboxd synopsis is literally the entire movie, word by word
Review by Daniel Mármol ★★½ 4

El cine ha sido un medio idóneo para representar la soledad y muchos films han logrado impactarme por tal reflejo de personajes solitarios y su aislamiento de la sociedad, uno de los primeros títulos que se me viene a la mente es Taxi Driver, pero si comienzo a profundizar un poco más sobre el sub-género aparecen otros grandes títulos como Solyaris, The Apartment, Wild Strawberries y la misma Her.

Je, Tu, Il, Elle es otro retrato sobre la soledad, uno muy particular por cierto, que cuenta la historia de una mujer solitaria en 3 actos y aunque a medida que va avanzado el metraje, la narrativa mejora, no puedo afirmar que me ha gustado enteramente lo que he visto. No…
Review by SmokingPizza ★★

reminded me of my second apartment
when I was eating .99 cent cup of noodles
nearly every day & deflating my air mattress
every morning because
I didn't own any furniture.