Wendy and Lucy – Films – Visions du Réel

Kelly Reichardt
United States | 80 min
Language : English
Subtitles : French

Despite Wendy’s (Michelle Williams) plan to head to Alaska to find work, a series of incidents forces her to abandon her journey in an Oregon parking lot. With no home and no support, she risks losing what little she has left. Frozen in time and space, Wendy careens from street to street in a static road movie of heartbreaking minimalism.

Wendy is heading to Alaska to find work. Homeless, she sleeps in her car, gathering up her last pennies to feed her dog, Lucy. When the car breaks down, Wendy is forced to stop in a washed-out small town in Oregon. Once there, she can find neither a job without an address, nor an address without a job, and the spiral of homelessness leaves her paralysed in a state of limbo. Trapped between a few streets where individualism rules supreme, she forms a bond with a security guard and fights to save what little she has left: her dog and her dignity. A parking lot road movie, Wendy and Lucy is Kelly Reichardt’s third feature film, as well as her first collaboration with actress Michelle Williams. Presented at Cannes in 2008, it is striking for the brilliant minimalism of its staging.

Léa Eigenmann

1994 – River of Grass1999 – Ode2002 – Then a Year2004 – Travis2006 – Old Joy2008 – Wendy and Lucy2010 – Meek’s Cutoff2013 – Night Moves2016 – Certain Women2019 – First Cow2019 – Owl2021 – Bronx, New York, Novembre 20192021 – Cal State Long Beach, CA, Janvier 20202022 – Showing Up2025 – The Mastermind