Twentynine Palms (2004)

43% of critics liked it
(37 reviews)
41% of users liked it
(1,450 ratings)

A couple drives their Humvee into the California desert. David (David Wissak) is ostensibly working, scouting locations near Twentynine Palms for a photo or film shoot. His girlfriend, Katia (Katia Golubeva from Leos Carax's Pola X), is along for the ride. David is American; Katia is French and… More A couple drives their Humvee into the California desert. David (David Wissak) is ostensibly working, scouting locations near Twentynine Palms for a photo or film shoot. His girlfriend, Katia (Katia Golubeva from Leos Carax's Pola X), is along for the ride. David is American; Katia is French and speaks little English. The couple travels through the desert, meandering through the vast, empty landscape. They argue. They make love. Writer/director Bruno Dumont (whose previous film, L'Humanité won the Grand Jury Prize at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival) uses long takes and an elliptical structure to frame the action as these two characters struggle to communicate while traversing the long, dusty roads. The trip includes a stop for Chinese food, a brief encounter with a belligerent motorist, an argument over ice cream, a painful run-in with a three-legged dog, and a huge argument in the middle of the night, during which the two come to blows. Katia and David reach an uneasy reconciliation, but their strained, though passionate, relationship, is pushed to the breaking point when a terrible, traumatic incident unexpectedly occurs on the road. But the ultimate horror of their little excursion is yet to come. Twentynine Palms was shown at the 2003 Toronto International Film Festival, and was shown by the Lincoln Center Film Society in 2004 as part of their annual Rendez-vous With French Cinema. ~ Josh Ralske, Rovi

Rating, Runtime: R, 1 hr. 59 min.
Directed By: Bruno Dumont
Written By: Bruno Dumont
Genres: Drama, Art House & International, Mystery & Suspense

In Theaters: Apr 9, 2004 Wide
On DVD: Sep 21, 2004
Studio: Wellspring

Critic Reviews

Ty Burr, Boston Globe
A textbook example of how a director can strip away plot, motivation, character, and meaning and still leave arrant pretension standing tall.
Ruthe Stein, San Francisco Chronicle
Muddled.
Michael Booth, Denver Post
In Twentynine Palms, writer and director Bruno Dumont takes his cultural revenge on the United States, attacking countless American stereotypes and in the process reinforcing an equal number of cliches about arrogant French auteurs.
Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post
It's alternately monotonous, hot and dramatic, which makes for a peculiar, not entirely unsatisfying atmosphere of neo -- or is that post? -- noir.
Bob Townsend, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
[Dumont] forces viewers to question not only what's on the screen, but ultimately, the very nature of reality.
Lisa Nesselson, Variety
[Brown Bunny] sports the narrative complexity of War and Peace compared with Twentynine Palms.
Emanuel Levy, EmanuelLevy.Com
The French picture aims to titillate and shock with its graphic sex and violence, but ultimately it's monotonous and pretentious.
Jay Antani, Cinema Writer
A movie full of surfaces but with exasperatingly little to say
Robert Davis, Paste Magazine
Twentynine Palms is another in a string of recent French movies in which the body is no longer sacred, a churning, jerking, oozing machine. But Dumont seems to be working toward human discovery.
Brian Gibson, Vue Weekly (Edmonton, Canada)
A narcissistic, wayward American male rage can only find release in a confusion of sex and violence . . . this startling, strange cine-philosophical experiment throws all the usual voyeuristic conventions of film into sudden, screeching reverse.
Nick Schager, Lessons of Darkness
Fascinating in the abstract but wearisome in reality.
Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews
The talented filmmaker laid an egg with this one.
Doris Toumarkine, Film Journal International
It's cheap thrills in an arty package.
Paul Sherman, Boston Herald
Both the characters and the setting are a bit of a blank here, so it's no surprise the movie is, too.
James Rocchi, Netflix
French exercise in California crisis and empty existentialism manages to be pointless, dim and brutal all at once.
, E! Online
Let's just say that Palms could shock the pants right off of you.

Read all 16 critic reviews

Critic ratings and reviews powered by RottenTomatoes.com

Fresh (60% or more critics rated the movie positively)

Rotten (59% or fewer critics rated the movie positively)

Featured Audience Ratings

Walter M

[font=Century Gothic]In Bruno Dumont's "Twentynine Palms", Dave is a photographer scouting locations in the California desert along with his French girlfriend, Katia. They are your typical couple, alternating bouts of lovemaking and arguing. But the real star of this… More
[font=Century Gothic]In Bruno Dumont's "Twentynine Palms", Dave is a photographer scouting locations in the California desert along with his French girlfriend, Katia. They are your typical couple, alternating bouts of lovemaking and arguing. But the real star of this movie is the beautifully desolate landscape that occasionally looks like it could be the surface of another planet. [/font][font=Century Gothic]"Twentynine Palms" is definitely an unsettling provocation that stays with you.[/font]
Dimitris S

Provocative but not relentless.I remote myself in a vast plain,mingled with the sky's peacefulness.I wouldn't wish though to have such temper aside of me.Palms as a fake plastic manuscript of thoughts and determinations.The couple is disjointed and yet so loving you feel… More
Provocative but not relentless.I remote myself in a vast plain,mingled with the sky's peacefulness.I wouldn't wish though to have such temper aside of me.Palms as a fake plastic manuscript of thoughts and determinations.The couple is disjointed and yet so loving you feel their inner loss towards the end.Dumont shows how much a film can present without shaky camera movement and a classic film-making persona.The outcast figure.

Cast

Yekaterina Golubeva
as Katia
David Wissack
as David

Now you can share movies with your friends on Facebook!

Discover movies your friends are watching
Keep track of what you want to see
Add your reviews to your Timeline

Get Started

Twentynine Palms (2004)

Critic Reviews

Featured Audience Ratings

Walter M

Dimitris S

Cast

Now you can share movies with your friends on Facebook!