In the haunting Two Days, One Night, directors Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne add a profound level of morality drama to their customarily brilliant trove of social reality themes explored since their outstanding first film, Le Promesse (1997). What is unique this time is they are working with an actress who is emerging as one of the very finest in film. Marion Cotillard’s versatility and skills are bringing her to a whole new level. Here she plays Sandra, a woman who has just been voted out of her job by 16 co-workers who, in a Hobson’s choice, collectively choose a cash bonus for themselves over concern for her continued employment.
Taking a simple story in terms of plot and plumbing its depths for signs of both human vanity and sacrifice, the Dardennes demonstrate a surgical skill in extracting every nuance of feeling from scenes of confrontation. Their films are always primarily character studies but here the stakes seem raised. Basic working people make the most meaningful impact with what seem on the surface as mere ordinary decisions. Sandra, reluctantly, and with heartbreaking fragility, is convinced by both a co-worker and her husband to find and visit each co-worker who voted against her. She must convince those who voted “no” to change their minds for a re-vote taking place in a mere two days. What may seem like a shallow Ayn Rand-esque virtue-of-selfishness mode of thinking takes on a level of complexity as some of Sandra’s co-workers express their own financial needs in refusing to give up their money.
Expressing a spare, savvy naturalism, Two Days, One Night seems steeped in a higher order of art–one concerned primarily with how people treat each other. Sandra’s plight seems bent on destroying her mental and emotional wellbeing yet no matter how stressed she becomes, she somehow moves on from one co-worker to the next, sufficiently composed. Attempting no grandstanding flourishes of persuasive oratory, nor any psychological angles, she offers matter-of-fact, in-your-face directness. As Sandra comes to make realizations about not only her co-workers, but also about herself, the film’s larger meanings and questions unfold. Playing a character as distressed but as equally determined as the memorable Bruno in the Dardennes’ film, L’enfant (2006), Cotillard surpasses her previous roles, including the Oscar-winning La Vie en Rose. She and her directors have constructed an insightful, wise film with great heart and a timeless subject: the struggle of man’s inhumanity to man versus an alternative sense of compassion and community.