Nocturama

Bonello sets a trap for his audience, making a film that features the deceptive sex appeal of terrorism. In Nocturama, however, it is not religious fanatics who carry out an act of senseless violence, but rather adventure-seeking hipsters. Moreover, the director purposefully emphasizes their physical attractiveness, and their actions are accompanied by hypnotic music (composed by Bonello himself), with the whole thing edited to look like a music video. Its high production value, propensity for intellectual provocation, and sensitivity to the demoralizing potential of pop culture puts the French director in the same class as the likes of Jean-Luc Godard and Pier Paolo Pasolini. Nocturama's kinship with the works of past masters is, however, less important than its roots in contemporary cinema. The fact that the terrorists portrayed on-screen are recruited from among nearly all the ethnic groups living in France allows Bonello to create a kind of bitter opposite to Cantet's The Class. It is also impossible, while watching Nocturama, not to think about the non-artistic context: there was a bloody terrorist attack in Nice less than a week after the official premiere of the film.