The Tenant (1976)

Le Locataire

Roman Polanski is a whole can of worms, frankly I’ve never seen a film of his I didn’t like, I don’t want to get into his life story, you can peep his wiki for details. His life has been bonkers, I guess there is a whole movie about him now, I’ll have to check it out, but having read the biography “Polanski” I’m hesitant, it is a harsh toke.

ANYWAYS, The Tenant is fucking brilliant. Really, in the genre of psychological thrillers there are very few five star films and this is damn close (maybe like four and a half?). It is the story of a quiet simple man who while apartment hunting finds a vacancy due to the previous tenant attempting suicide, she is in the hospital and not expected to get better. He visits her in the hospital, while doing so meets one of her friends. He moves into her place after her passing and it still contains her clothing and personal affects. At the corner cafe, he begins to have her usual drinks, cigarettes.

All the while his neighbors are complaining at the slightest sound coming from his room and becoming more antagonistic by the day, ghostly figures stare at him from across the courtyard, strange visions and an increasing feeling of paranoia, claustrophobia and persecution. But this feeling doesn’t really have you until the last third of the film, it comes on so slow you don’t realize how uncomfortable its making you until it is very much so.

The structure of conspiracy and persecution that feels very immediate due to us only seeing through our protagonists eyes is very much in the vein of Rosemary’s Baby, but does not feel like a retread.

I have to mention that the soundtrack and the camera work are both fucking wonderful. Long, long tracking shots that are so beautiful and creepy. Kinda “Shining” esque.

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