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A small and rather shoddy circus stops in a coastal town to play their
stale performances to scarce audiences ... while the real drama happens
behind the scenes: The circus director Heroy (Tchéky Karyo) might or
might not be a former gangster and rolling in the dough despite pretending
to be as poor as his performers, but circus magician Zéphyr (Bruzno
Putzulu) thinks he has found him out and now needs someone to get rid of
Heroy ... so how about clown Elliot (Denis Lavant), whose wife Angèle
(Natacha Régnier) has an affair with Heroy - while Elliot himself is
lusted after by soothsayer Zohra (Béatrice Dalle). At least since he has
found out about his wife's affair (but probably longer), Elliot has lost
touch with reality, and his own conscience (Iggy Pop) seems to be his most
constant companion - but Elliot has no idea what his conscience tries to
say to him, and ultimately this leads to a tragic finale ... True,
in writing Starlight might sound like nothing more than a
circus-set soap opera, but as mundane as the film might seem, storywise,
it really plays in a league all of its own due to its directorial approach
that mixes dream and reality in a phantasmagorical way, doesn't shy away
from the surreal and the absurd, and makes the most of its circus location
and especially its dreamlike atmosphere intermingled with its shoddiness. A
film that really gets you on an emotional level.
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