There ought to be a lifetime achieement award for the Dardenne Brothers

The Dardenne Brothers continue to make astonishingly good films about life among the working class in northern France/Belgium, and the latest, Two Days, One Night, continues their examination of people in the France that is not about wine and tourism. They are unflinching in their realism, honest and open in their examination of characters, masters at building plot and suspense within a framework of realism, and subtle but provocative in their political point of view. Two Days is the story of a young mom (Marion Cottilard, playing Sandra) who faces an immediate dilemma: her factory co-workers (they make solar panels, a nice touch) have been forced to vote on whether to bring her back to work (she has been on medical leave because of panic attacks), which, if they do, means forfeiting their 1,000 Euro bonus. They vote something like 12 to 4 against her - but spurred by a friend Sandra gets the coolly indifferent boss to let them vote again on Monday (because the foreman put unfair pressure on the workers to vote for the bonus). Sandra has the task, w/ help from her kindly husband (husbands/boyfriends are not often so devoted in Dardenne films) she sets about speaking to each of the co-workers to make her case - building up the the vote on Monday. Her visits to each - each of which is a story unto itself, in a way - present vivid portrait of the lives of the working class in one of the ugly suburbs or industrial cities: the landscape of crappy housing, cheap bars and grocery stories and Laundromats - so far from the American image of France. And these meetings expose the class exploitation - getting workers to go against one another so each can hold onto his or her job - when it's obvious that the next year it will be someone else's neck on the block. I will not give the ending away - only will say it's both surprising and satisfying. The look, the feel, the pacing of this movie, all are beautiful and subtle - the kind of movie just plain not made in the US these days, where Indies are all about "relationships" and youth and rarely about politics and labor, or not so directly anyway. I know the Dardennes have won many awards, and I expect they will continue to do so - but there ought to be a new kind of award for them, a lifetime achievement award even for younger filmmakers, as their films are of a piece and form a comprehensive and provocative world view.