‘Coma’ Review: Bertrand Bonello’s Lockdown Project Will Have You Longing to Go Outside and Touch Grass
variety.comMichael Nordine authorFew things will have you longing for an end to the pandemic like “Coma,” an experimental lockdown project from French provocateur Bertrand Bonello.
If you’re the type to dread being alone with your thoughts, try being locked in a room with Bonello’s: The “Nocturama” director’s ruminations on free will, dreams and the deeper meaning of Michael Jackson’s music will have you longing to fall into a deep sleep, just so you don’t have to listen to it anymore.
A project this insular and meandering might have been excusable in the early days of quarantine, but two years’ worth of exemplary work produced during the pandemic make the navel-gazing on display here all the more questionable.
At times “Coma” is closer to an essay film than it is to anything resembling a narrative — down to a narrated letter from Bonello that both opens and closes proceedings — and may well have been more accomplished had it fully committed to that approach.
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