COMA -- Bertrand Bonello's Pandemic Film Is Still Impressive Despite Datedness

Review by Sean Boelman

Since Coma’s debut at the 2022 Berlinale, French filmmaker Bertrand Bonello has already shot, premiered, and released his next film, The Beast. However, Coma is just now getting its release in the United States, and although it does feel a bit dated, there’s still plenty to respect about the picture as a work of avant-garde cinema.

The movie follows a teenage girl who, amid the lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic, becomes infatuated with the teachings and persona of a mysterious vlogger, causing her to begin to lose her grip on reality. Ultimately, Coma is the type of film whose narrative is more a vehicle to deliver commentary than a satisfying experience in and of itself, so how much the film works for viewers will depend heavily on how much they can connect with Bonello’s message.

Like much of Bonello’s work, Coma is incredibly dense and demands close attention and analysis. Even though the runtime clocks in under 80 minutes before credits, its highly experimental nature means that it will test the patience of all but the most studious cinephiles. Even so, it’s not a particularly enjoyable or entertaining movie, with Bonello opting for a more evocative approach. 

Still, one can’t help but admire some of the ambitious swings Bonello takes with the cinematic form here. The most interesting gimmick in the film is the inclusion of sequences shot with dolls as the characters, but there are plenty of visually compelling sequences, including animated scenes, dreamlike iconography, and bookends with no audio and only subtitles telling the story.

And as far as movies shot during the COVID pandemic go, Coma is arguably one of the most effective. Not only does it do an excellent job of capturing the unique feeling of collective anxiety we felt at the time, but it also doesn’t feel overly limited by its isolationism. Bonello fills the frame in interesting ways, giving it a sense of kineticism that many of these films lacked.

That said, Bonello arguably bites off more than he can chew in a thematic sense. The movie’s core is about online culture and our consumption of online content. However, framing that through the lens of the pandemic — a time when we were all consuming unprecedented levels of online content — introduces another theme. Some of the content the protagonist watches online also adds more thematic depth, such as an exploration of our society’s obsession with death and serial killers. Coma is full of interesting ideas, but not all are investigated sufficiently.

It also doesn’t help that the film’s characters feel so underdeveloped. Louise Labèque and Julia Faure both give fittingly alluring and mysterious performances, but their characters feel like they exist for little more purpose than reaction and exposition, respectively. Although viewers will identify with the protagonist’s disillusionment, the distance from the COVID-19 pandemic undeniably hurts the movie a bit.

Although Coma may have been released a couple of years too late, it’s still possible to admire Bertrand Bonello’s pandemic-era psychological thriller from afar. Bonello has done some incredible things with form, especially considering his limitations while making the film, and those intrigued by his heavily experimental approach to filmmaking will find plenty to respect here.

Coma hits theaters on May 17.

Rating: 4/5