The Man with the Suitcase

The Man with the Suitcase

1983 · 61 min · ★ 6.3 · TV Movie, Comedy

A sensitivity to sounds coming from the activities of an unwelcome guest in the close quarters of an apartment is only one important component in this atmospheric, avant-garde drollery by Chantal Akerman. When the apartment owner comes home, her guest is settled in and at first, the slightly reclusive host decides simply to eat her breakfast in her room instead of having to face morning conversation with her guest. Sounds of the toilet flushing, the bath water running and splashing, footsteps pacing, and furniture moving invade the hostess' refuge in her bedroom like the frontrunners of an all-out offensive. She locks herself up for 28 days, life's detritus accumulating around her, just so she does not have to go out to face the nemesis that lurks beyond her door.

Directed by Chantal Akerman · Written by Chantal Akerman

Your Rating

Where to Watch

Rent or Buy

Cast

Make it a double feature

2h 45m together

The Man with the Suitcase

Letters Home

Both from Chantal Akerman.

More from Chantal AkermanSee all →

Franz Schubert's Last Three Piano Sonatas

Franz Schubert's Last Three Piano Sonatas · 1989

Franz Schubert's Last Three Piano Sonatas

MovieDocumentaryMusic

A portrait of pianist Alfred Brendel performing and analysing Franz Schubert's final three sonatas.

Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles

Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles · 1976

Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles

A lonely young widow lives with her son following an immutable order: while the boy is in school, she cares for their apartment, does chores, and receives clients in the afternoon.

Letters Home

Letters Home · 1986

MovieTV MovieDrama

A filmed adaptation of Rose Leiman Goldemberg’s play, based on Sylvia Plath’s intense correspondence with her mother Aurelia, from the time the poet was in university until her suicide. Delphine Seyrig and her niece Coralie Seyrig recite Sylvia and Aurelia’s letters to the audience directly.

News from Home

News from Home · 1976

MovieDocumentary

Impersonal and beautiful images of Akerman's life in New York are combined with letters from her loving but manipulative mother, read by Akerman herself.

Moving In

Moving In · 1993

"A man stands amid unpacked boxes in his new home, delivering an extended monologue on indecision and dislocation. This rarely seen, overlooked gem created by Akerman for television explores the quotidian crises and profound feelings of alienation that run through her work." - BAM

The Meetings of Anna

The Meetings of Anna · 1978

The Meetings of Anna

Detached filmmaker Anna Silver arrives in Germany to show her latest film; over the course of some days, she encounters a variety of new and old faces, some of whom make personal revelations to her to little affect.

East with Sonia Wieder-Atherton

East with Sonia Wieder-Atherton · 2009

East with Sonia Wieder-Atherton

MovieDocumentaryMusic

Presented in 2 parts, this 83 minute piece documents Wieder-Atherton's idea to do a set of pieces from across central and eastern Europe, including Russia. Some weren't originally written for cello, but she had them transcribed. Some were songs for voices, which goes with Wieder-Atherton saying in an earlier film she made with Chantal Akerman that she aspires to play the cello in a way that it carries the specificity of emotion of the human voice. She explains at the beginning of both parts how she feels each country in the region has it's own personality expressed in its music, coming from its individual history and culture, but that each land in the area is also 'impregnated' as she puts it, by the others, so there are certain elements that run throughout.

From the East

From the East · 1993

MovieDocumentary

In this incisive dispatch from the newly collapsed Soviet empire, bullet holes from WWII still pockmark the old stone buildings. Akerman journeys from East Germany to Moscow between the late summer and winter of 1993 ('while there’s still time'), chronicling in deliberate tracking shots, circular pans, and domestic tableaux yet another moment of radical upheaval in the 20th-century, the faces and bodies of Poles, Ukrainians, Germans, and Russians weighed down with obedient resignation and uncertainty.

Lest We Forget

Lest We Forget · 1991

MovieDocumentaryDrama

A compilation of 30 French filmmakers, Alain Resnais and Jean Luc Godard among them, who use film to make a plea on behalf of a political prisoner. Jean Luc Godard and Anne Marie Mieville's film concerns the plight of Thomas Wanggai, West Papuan activist who has since died in prison. The short films were commissioned by Amnesty International.

Portrait of a Young Girl at the End of the '60s in Brussels

Portrait of a Young Girl at the End of the '60s in Brussels · 1994

Portrait of a Young Girl at the End of the '60s in Brussels

MovieTV MovieDrama

The main character, Michèle, spends the hour discussing her views of life with some old and new friends, and tries to understand her own feelings about her place in the world and her sexuality, while a camera follows along at close range.

Toute une nuit

Toute une nuit · 1982

MovieDramaRomance

Following over two dozen different individuals in the almost wordless atmosphere of a dark night in a Brussels town, acceptance and rejection in the realm of romance is examined.

Chantal Akerman by Chantal Akerman

Chantal Akerman by Chantal Akerman · 1997

Chantal Akerman by Chantal Akerman

MovieDocumentary

Janine Bazin and André Labarthe approached Chantal Akerman about making a film for the series; eagerly, Akerman proposed a number of filmmakers—but all had already been done. So she suggested…“How about me?” Akerman creates a fascinating self-portrait that takes us through her career, aided by critics Emmanuel Burdeau and Jean Narboni and filmmaker Luc Moullet.

Je Tu Il Elle

Je Tu Il Elle · 1974

MovieDramaRomance

A woman suffers a subdued psychological breakdown in the wake of a devastating breakup.

Golden Eighties

Golden Eighties · 1986

Golden Eighties

MovieMusicComedy

In a lively shopping center, proprietors and customers are bustling, including three women vying for a man's heart with song and dance.

Portrait of a Lazy Woman

Portrait of a Lazy Woman · 1986

Portrait of a Lazy Woman

MovieComedyDocumentary

Belgian director Chantal Akerman struggles to overcome her laziness in the name of making a film about the subject.

Tell Me

Tell Me · 1980

MovieTV MovieDocumentary

Chantal Akerman meets with elderly Jewish women in Paris, all of them survivors of the Shoah, and listens to their family stories. Between interviews, Akerman's mother Natalia speaks of her own family. Made for a French miniseries on grandmothers.

More Like This

Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself

Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself · 2002

Wilbur Wants to Kill Himself

MovieComedyDrama

The strange comedy film of two close brothers; one, Wilbur, who wants to kill himself, and the other, Harbour, who tries to prevent this. When their father dies leaving them his bookstore they meet a woman who makes their lives a bit better yet with a bit more trouble as well.

Italian for Beginners

Italian for Beginners · 2000

Italian for Beginners

MovieComedyDrama

Several lonely hearts in a semi-provincial suburb of a town in Denmark use a beginner's course in Italian as the platform to meet the romance of their lives. The film, which unspools the connections and family drama shared between the students, complies with several aesthetic principles of Dogme 95 movement.

Lost in Translation

Lost in Translation · 2003

Lost in Translation

MovieDramaComedy

Two lost souls visiting Tokyo -- the young, neglected wife of a photographer and a washed-up movie star shooting a TV commercial -- find an odd solace and pensive freedom to be real in each other's company, away from their lives in America.

Four Rooms

Four Rooms · 1995

It's Ted the Bellhop's first night on the job...and the hotel's very unusual guests are about to place him in some outrageous predicaments. It seems that this evening's room service is serving up one unbelievable happening after another.

Out to Sea

Out to Sea · 1997

MovieComedyRomance

Care-free Charlie cons his widower brother-in-law Herb into an expenses-paid luxury cruise in search of rich, lonely ladies. The catch is that they are required to be dance hosts! With a tyrannical cruise director, and the luscious Liz and lovely Vivian, our heroes have lots of mis-adventures before they finally return to port.

Better Than Chocolate

Better Than Chocolate · 1999

Better Than Chocolate

MovieDramaRomance

Not long after moving into her own place, Maggie finds herself with two unsolicited roommates: her recently divorced mother, Lila, and her young brother. The timing is especially bad, considering Maggie has fallen hard for an attractive woman, Kim, only hours before they move in. What could be a nonissue becomes increasingly complicated -- since Maggie's family is unaware of her sexual orientation, and Maggie is not open to sharing that information.

Laughter and Punishment

Laughter and Punishment · 2003

Laughter and Punishment

MovieDramaComedy

French director Isabelle Doval directs her husband, popular comedic actor José Garcia, in the comedy Rire et Chatiment (Laughter and Punishment). Vincent (Garcia) is a popular physician whose aggressive need to be funny and get people's attention annoys his girlfriend, Camille (Doval), to the point that she leaves him. He begins to suspect she might have been onto something when his behavior begins causing people to die.

The Proposal

The Proposal · 2009

MovieComedyRomance

When she learns she's in danger of losing her visa status and being deported, overbearing book editor Margaret Tate forces her put-upon assistant, Andrew Paxton, to marry her.

Rate this film

Your ratings make Midnight smarter