Synopsis
Trailers
Reviews (64)
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K
“I’m not trying to creep you out. I’m trying to be precise.” This is an important kind of truth, the kind of raw honesty that when spoken to, say, ten people in a room, will cause four to leave in disgust, five more to leave profoundly uncomfortable and overcome with pity…but one, and there only has to be one to make it worth it, will be so grateful that someone else knows how they feel, has been where they have been and, most importantly, survived. Scars might be ugly to you but to a person with a gaping wound they are a lighthouse. There’s so much I can relate to — the addiction, the writing, the anger. I grew up…
1,063 13 -
M
Deeply arty and pretentious in a way I found genuine and productive. Not infrequently Too Much, which I appreciated, and on top of that occasionally erotic in a way that’s simultaneously subtle and confrontational. KStew unsurprisingly has the juice!
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D
When famous actors decide to try their hand at filmmaking, the results can be — and often are — unremarkable by design. Timid and safe with a network TV aesthetic that screams “I’m a lot more afraid behind the camera than I am in front of it.” Not so of Kristen Stewart’s “The Chronology of Water.” Not in the slightest. Some movies are shot. This one was directed. Which isn’t to suggest this aggressively fragmented adaptation of Lidia Yuknavitch’s memoir should be graded on a curve because its famous auteur dared to film on 16mm, or even because she had the skill required to adapt her source material with the same febrile porousness that made it such a striking piece…
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E
I really do live for movies made entirely by people who have torn their hearts out. You can tell, there’s so much in this (inevitable with such a life). Kept thinking about Jennette McCurdy’s memoir as well tbh. Truly believe every single shot has a hell of a lot to say, there are a lot of them and I could honestly watch them as a photo book with fewer words, but I was moved quite a few times.
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I
so beautifully bold and ambitious. maybe it gets a little carried away but kristen stewart has such a way with images that she makes even the mundane look breathtaking. i sincerely hope the next one doesn’t take eight years
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A
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P
Idk how to explain it but this is exactly the type of movie I’d expect Kristen Stewart to direct
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C
“My arms ache. My sister is gone.” ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod. There is blood all over the shower tiles and the walls and in my mouth. Felt a scream building in my chest from start to finish and the inability to let it out has left me with bruised ribs and a too frantic heartbeat. So angry, so desperately honest, so frenetic, so unrestrained. Brushes up against Jane Arden’s The Other Side of the Underneath. Cradles some of Stewart’s earliest work like Speak in the crook of its arms. So many things coming together to create The Chronology of Water, the sort of loose, fractured, hazy nightmarish dream of a film that I spend constant hours longing for. Lot of walk outs during…
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L
AFI 2025: film #17 “before i hated him, i loved him” the older i get, the more trauma i collect, the more grief i experience, the more i find myself haunted. memories slap me in the face out of left field, and one particularly sinister bad dream can ruin my whole day upon waking. the memories stack up in my mind, pushing old ones out to take up space, infecting my cranium like a virus that’ll never shake loose. and no matter how well i’m doing and how happy i am in life, these ghosts live with me now, unpacking their bags and settling down, and every day i adjust to their presence all that to say, this surprised the…
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J
this movie is so… tumblr. it looks great and the editing is really cool but man!!! its like this movie was made to be reblogged by pretentious fourteen year olds. the dialogue was actually making me feel crazy, and this is coming from a girl who is still active on tumblr in 2025 so… its really gotta be bad for it to be too much for even me! two stars for the two fiona apple needle drops
827 20 -
M
THE CHRONOLOGY OF WATER floored me from start to finish with its fragmented but precise editing, uncompromising vision, and the raw, fearless performance of Imogen Poots, delivering her finest work yet. This is a pure art house biopic that scratches, pierces, and digs under the skin, confronting the viewer with a blistering emotional intensity that some may find too much to bear. To that end, Kristen Stewart’s directorial debut is unflinching & abrasive, a grueling exploration of pain that’s as likely to move you as it is to leave you shaken.
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P
actually, this was exactly what i’d imagine kristen stewart to direct. to think that it is her directorial debut.. i gladly will be tuning in for everything that comes out of her hands. this was a truly hard watch. devastating, traumatizing, not for everyone. i even had to skip some scenes, particulary the more graphic ones, for my own well-being. yet stewart managed to combine the rawness of it with her artistic soul. it makes you ache, it is disturbing,…
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R
Wild adventure
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R
Most beautiful cinematography and storytelling I’ve seen.
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I
r.i.p kathy acker
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S
I liked the characters enough and wish it was more of a straightforward story. I didn’t like the frenetic editing jumping all over the place. A little too artsy fartsy for me.
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Nnalu 8 月 25, 2026
it’s an audio book with instagramable imagery
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P
OMG Kim Gordon, qu’est-ce que tu fais là !!
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S
извините но это пахнет графоманией
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R
Buon esordio registico della Stewart. Se regia e montaggio volevano trasmettere il senso di angoscia della protagonista, ci sono riusciti.
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Tteodorchem 8 月 25, 2026
joj
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E
It’s giving 2014 tumblr I love that
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M
Thematically interesting, but with overly exhausting editing. The good acting may be its only saving grace.
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A
unsure of thoughts but will give 4.5* for now.. very winslowcoded throughout (peaking with 16mm fragmented sadomasochistic lesbian kim gordon) but also left me thinking nothing much afterwards
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S
The movie kinda mistakes being sad for being deep. Otherwise beautifully shot with very striking visuals
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V
heavy af, loved the colors/frames/compositions. and imogen is just so so good
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S
Kristen Stewart, you *will* be paying for my next therapy appointment Possibly watched this at the worst possible time in my life to watch a movie like this, and yet it’s still undeniably excellent?
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P
wrenching movie and so Kristen Stewart coded
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S
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AAlice Domenis 8 月 25, 2026
You can tell this visceral film was directed by a woman. And this woman portrayed the intersection of trauma, pain, and sexuality, exploring how physical and psychological suffering can be inextricably linked, while resisting conventional, voyeuristic eroticism by framing intense, consensual physical experiences as a response to internal chaos. A thought – I admire (and envy) people like Lidia who did eventually find something healthy to channel their trauma into. Another thought: I appreciated Kim Gordon playing the part of…
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W
what a directorial debut wow. the story, the cinematography, the focus on sensory continuity, retrospective and fragmented scenes scattered all across, the dreamlike flashbacks- so fucking captivating. the rich colours, allegories and score, just everything about this film has drawn me in. most of all imogen’s performance that was so raw and truly a breath of fresh air, she went all out. i know kristen stewart well enough to recognise her words and through lidia’s narration her voice was really…
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T
I got so much pressure from my chest.
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S
Fiona Apple needle drop hit me like truck
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E
Boring relentless trauma porn edited like an art student that just discovered performance art and soundscaping
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C
A harrowing watch. Well crafted, but I probably wasn’t the target audience.
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E
i can see how the editing and voiceovers could be seen as annoying and the actual story was sometimes lost amongst everything else happening but i think it really worked overall the layering of the audio and visuals of somewhat unrelated scenes was especially unsettling and seeing as i didnt watch this in cinema in case i cried too hard i think that was definitely the right choice its heavy handed at times sure but the story is no less arresting and it was nice to breathe at the end – shes going to be okay 😀
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Ffinnholland 8 月 25, 2026
NZIFF #17 I had to finish this at home on account of the filmmakers graduating from the Sirāt school of trying to kill the audience. A capital F capital B Feel Bad movie that is also probably quite good and I would like to watch another feature from Kristen Stewart very soon.
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V
C’est un film d’une beaute exceptionnelle pour parler de traumas absolument horrible. C’est tellement bien fait et bien montré que s’en est presque malaisant à certains moment.
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M
No soy quien era hace 2hs; no soy quien era hace 2 años. Contar una vida; quién soy si no escribo.
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J
Perhaps it is because I am neither a women nor a sexual crimes victim, but what the fuck is this?
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S
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K
Trzy sceny masturbacji w ciągu pół godziny filmu to jest przesada (i totalnie niepotrzebne)
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C
proves the even the most interesting writer, with a fascinating (but depressing) life story, makes a bad movie protagonist 🥱😓 the work of writing is almost impossible to dramatize visually without being boring (e.g. ppl sitting at a desk looking thoughtfully at a blank page) or dumbed down (e.g. Lydia gasping in revelation at coming up with the title “The Chronology of Water”) and all serious writing, even when it’s good, sounds silly when read aloud at live readings or in voice over! I did go and buy the book after watching the movie tho 👍
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H
For better and worse, this was exactly what I anticipated it would be.
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R
There’s a lot of shots and editing that suggest this may be artful but its two hour runtime is not sustained by it being mostly miserable and horny, yet traumatic, with a dense air of pretension.
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M
I thought that was John Goodman & letterboxd is only now telling me that was Jim Belushi !!!!???
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M
A tough watch for both content and filmmaking style. Although the story has alot of poignantly raw depictions of grief and trauma, its style of showing cutaway images and abstract ideas felt more like an art piece than a narrative film.
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A
the film is artistically consistent, but narratively it’s chaotic and messy… it’s so full with trauma that, in this particular case, I think there’s simply too much of it, which made it really difficult for me to sit through from a directing point, it’s not the worst, but the screenplay is where it falls apart because this stream-of-consciousness narrative becomes exhausting in the long run – especially when the film runs for over two hours
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G
There is no doubt in my mind – Kristen Stewart absolutely has the juice. This is a blistering and visceral feature debut. I have never seen a story like this told this way – a cinematic tone poem that could be likened to the French New Wave or Malick in its sensuality and non linear storytelling, but honing those aesthetic qualities to focus entirely on pain. Every shot seems filled with intention and meaning – my only criticism is that…
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K
At a loss for words and thoughts. A pretentiously brutal experience of trauma going on for 2h. It is painfully innovative through the first half, and repulsively repetitive in the second. I found myself struggling through the iterative flashes that I deem overused, I believe somewhere along the way they have lost their influence because of that. The performance of Imogen Poots however overshadowed the entire movie. A brilliant and genius acting that made me feel uncomfortably vulnerable alongside the character. A truly stomach churning performance.
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B
this film was so challenging, so beautiful and so sad. i think kristen stewart is incredibly talented and i’m so excited to see her continue with directing.
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Llilacwine33 8 月 25, 2026
,kristen stewart you’re truly insane
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M
Plex 8-25-26
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S
kurdeee dopiero dziś ten shit oglądam, jakimś cudem ominąłem ominąłem na camer. ✍️
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VVl1ly 8 月 24, 2026
A powerful, moving work that -if its experimental arthouse presentation works for you- embeds itself in your soul. I’ve been uncertain of what to write about this as its a depiction of real events that a human who exists in the world experienced. Stewart’s presentation is subtly explosive, the fractured editing and sound mixing replaying sounds experienced by Ludia in childhood, a sharp crack, a slap, a sigh, creates a hyper-vigilance in the audience that is summoned when similar noises…
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T
so glad i finally got to see the chronology of water (thank you amelia!) i have lots of thoughts and feelings but i don’t really know how to fairly review this. so confronting and gorgeous and an extremely impressive directorial debut from kristen stewart. if you can watch this in the cinemas do it for the sound design alone. it overwhelms you, it’s confronting and although it’s coupled with blurs of memories or visuals of water it never shields the audience…
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D
NZIFF 2026 #26 A film in five parts – to be honest I don’t care about the chapter, it was still a cohesive story. And that’s saying something because you have to pay real attention to the nonlinear nature of this film. The trauma is deep, and Lyla (Imogen Potts) has difficulty navigating and shaping the direction of her future. Water plays an important part.
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D
the way the sounds are used in this is revolutionary
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R
Powerful. Deeply disturbing and uncomfortable but ultimately hopeful. Imogen Poots is stellar. Kristen Stewart directs the hell out of this. It’s visually psychedelic and thematically rich. Lidia’s life is broken up in moments like the memories that we hold onto. Really intense and I will be rewatching at some point.
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S
I knew I should have made a review walking out of the theater when I saw this film, but I was so insanely floored and awestruck that I didn’t. There will be a review when I get the chance to preview this once again. Fantastic film.
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C
This is one tough watch … in fact I left early; but not because of the quality of the film. Kristen is going to be some kind of edgy film-maker. TCOW is both powerful and important. It’s art-house (what ever that means) and depicts a strong minded young lady who has baggage; little of her own doing. How do I recommend a film that might disturb you?
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F
imogen poots always starred in some bullshit, having seen her very randomly on some projects, she definitely left everything on the table here. i think there’s a lot to take away from this, but ultimately lidia built something good for her life after her father tried to demoralize her time and time again, her sister running away from the problem while she had no problems facing it head on. the old man clearly was showing signs of dementia, but ultimately…
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A
idk something got lost in translation
- Synopsis
- Plagued by an abusive childhood, a woman finds escape in competitive swimming, sexual experimentation, toxic relationships, and addiction before ultimately finding her voice through writing.
- Director
- Kristen Stewart
- Writer
- Kristen Stewart
- Studio
- Scott Free Productions, CG Cinéma, Forma Pro Films, Curious Gremlin
- Country
- USA, France, Latvia, Switzerland
- Language
- English
- Year
- 2025
- Runtime
- 128 mins
- France16 May 2025
- Poland19 Jul 2025
- Australia15 Aug 2025
- Hungary06 Sep 2025
- France12 Sep 2025
- South Korea18 Sep 2025
- Indonesia30 Sep 2025
- Thailand04 Oct 2025
- Brazil08 Oct 2025
- USA10 Oct 2025
- Netherlands12 Oct 2025
- USA13 Oct 2025
- Germany14 Oct 2025
- UK16 Oct 2025
- Austria18 Oct 2025
- USA26 Oct 2025
- USA31 Oct 2025
- USA04 Nov 2025
- Greece05 Nov 2025
- Poland06 Nov 2025
- Slovenia13 Nov 2025
- Philippines14 Nov 2025
- Taiwan16 Nov 2025
- Germany01 Dec 2025
- China04 Dec 2025
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