Zunächst aber eine Zusammenfassung der Handlung:
"Certain Women" erzählt die Geschichte von 3 Frauen in der Kleinstadt Livingston, Montana. Der Film ist in 3 Teile aufgeteilt, doch die Charaktere bzw. Handlungsstränge hängen miteinander zusammen. Kristen spielt eine angehende Anwältin, Beth, die nach Livingston kommt, auf der Suche nach einem Job. Neben Kristen spielen auch Michelle Williams und Laura Dern mit. (Es ist recht schwierig, den Film zusammenzufassen, da jede Seite ein wenig von einander abweicht..)
Screen Daily hat aber eine knappe, übersichtliche Zusammenfassung geschrieben: Set in Montana, and based on a series of short stories by native Maile Meloy, this film combines three loosely connected vignettes centered around professional women and their encounters with others from the community.
Kristens Rolle ist eher ein Nebencharakter, doch sie hat bei allen einen großen Eindruck hinterlassen. Independent-Filme sind einfach Kristens Ding. Sie gibt so viel Energie und Hingabe in ihre Rollen, dafür wird sie immer wieder gelobt. <3
The Guardian Like Reichardt’s directorial hand, the performances are understated across the board, but deeply felt. Gladstone conveys a heartbreaking sense of yearning, while never verbally stating as much. Dern and Williams, playing women who face sexism over the course of their two storylines, simmer under the surface with palpable anger. And Stewart continues to impress, following a revelatory performance in Clouds of Sils Maria, as a young woman seemingly oblivious to the effect she has others. 4 von 5 Sternen
Consequence of Sound Similarly, Stewart keeps the momentum going following last year’s head-turning work in Clouds of Sils Maria as she delivers another nuanced performance as Travis. Her few reactions say so much — something as small as the way she hunches over a grilled cheese sandwich even — and further elaborate her inherent struggles.
Screen Daily Stewart, in particular, has never been more credibly gloomy as an overtired young lawyer, who always looks cold and has dark circles around her eyes. Her story, but specifically her tentative connection with the small-town female ranch hand, is the most emotionally rich of the three narratives.
Flavorwire The big new draw is Stewart, who immediately proclaimed, “I’m a Reichardt fan” and praised the filmmaker’s refusal to “package up and deliver you thisnotion. It doesn’t happen. Her movies, because they’re so composed — they’re not found, they’re not messy, you don’t just, like, get it up on someone’s shoulder and be like, ‘We get whatever we get’ — it’s super thoughtful in its approach, and slow, and steady, and the fact that she has the patience and the interest in things that people don’t normally look at is what paces her movies. That and the comfortability of watching nothing — because there’s alwayssomething in there.
Variety Though this is arguably the most illustrious ensemble Reichardt has ever had to hand, the pic’s performance style is as casually organic and democratic as in any of her more scrappily cast early projects. There’s complete onscreen parity, for example, between a relative newcomer like Gladstone and a megawatt star like Stewart — both unobtrusively superb — while Williams, in her third collaboration with Reichardt, underplays with terse modesty. Playing most recognizably to a star persona is Dern, if only because said persona has been built on the kind of creased, empathetic decency that makes her a Reichardt natural.Indiewire (geht nicht speziell auf Kristen ein, gibt dem Film aber insgesamt eine Bewertung von A-)