Two Different Approaches to Cinema: “A House of Dynamite” and “Girl”

Two other films in the competition at the 82nd Venice Film Festival, both vivid examples of the variety embraced by the festival’s selection, were the American production A House of Dynamite, directed by Kathryn Bigelow —a military thriller set within the confines of government offices— and the Taiwanese film Nühai (Girl), the directorial debut of the prolific actress Shu Qi, a story rooted in social and family drama.

Considered the closing chapter of a war trilogy following The Hurt Locker (2008), centered on the Iraq War, and Zero Dark Thirty (2012), focused on Afghanistan, A House of Dynamite envisions a future scenario—a forewarning of what could become the ultimate ending: a nuclear conflict just two red buttons away. This time, we are not on the dusty battlegrounds of wars that the United States exports to the Middle East; instead, we are inside the governmental offices of the American empire.

A House of Dynamite (Kathryn Bigelow, 2025)

The conflict unfolds primarily within ultra-technological spaces filled with devices that signal the progression of an imminent attack from an unknown origin. Eighteen minutes to react, stretched into nearly two hours of film, narrated successively from two different perspectives. A dilemma reminiscent of Thirteen Days and the political handling of the Cuban Missile Crisis—but this time with far less time. Starring Rebecca Ferguson as a high-ranking Intelligence officer and Idris Elba as the President of the nation, the film is a masterclass in military suspense, flawless in its adherence to the canonical codes of the genre: every setting, every character type, every sound effect, every variation in editing rhythm; and precisely because of that, it leaves the impression that there is nothing we haven’t already seen before.

It lays bare the paradox of a global defensive posture that could obliterate the world in the blink of an eye, yet offers no deeper reflection on how we arrived at this point or what alternative approaches might exist. It lacks a soul to inhabit this otherwise magnificent formal exercise.

Nühai (Girl) (Shu Qi, 2025).

On the other hand, the Taiwanese film Nühai (Girl), directed by Shu Qi —the two-time Golden Horse-winning actress making her directorial debut— addresses another kind of global threat, one more mundane and intricately woven into everyday life: gender-based and domestic violence. With exquisite cinematography and occasional visual flourishes that flirt briefly with the dreamlike, the film depicts the childhood of a girl marked by material and emotional precarity. Its fleeting references to Alice in Wonderland and Le Ballon Rouge suggest a playful intention, while the story itself remains deeply disheartening.

The way it presents the child’s world diverges from a classic narrative structure; there is no linear conflict demanding resolution, although one exists. Instead, the film progresses cumulatively, delving ever deeper into layers of emotional, familial, and social failings that render life a bleak, irreparable place, where escape becomes the only form of liberation.

Both films represent two fundamentally different ways of understanding cinema, making it fruitful to contrast them. One speaks of an imminent threat of total annihilation; the other of a gradual destruction of life. The hegemony of American cinema seems long since exhausted, yet it remains so effective—and we are so accustomed to it—that it is impossible not to admire. Fortunately, other horizons also exist, other ways of structuring narratives and thinking about film.