“A chamber piece bound by space but expansive in theme.”

Claire Denis is often considered one of the greatest living filmmakers, and for good reason. Across her career she has crafted monumental works of cinema – Beau Travail, White Material, and 35 Shots of Rum – films that stand among the all-timers. With her latest film The Fence, premiering at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, Denis has once again delivered a strong and sensuous work, one that contemplates relationships, power, and the lingering violence of colonialism.

Set within the fences and walls of a private construction company in Africa, The Fence is a chamber piece bound by space but expansive in theme. Matt Dillon plays Horn, the foreman and boss of the site, with Tom Blyth as Cal, his trusted lieutenant and the only other white employee. On this particular day they await the arrival of Horn’s wife Leonie (Mia McKenna-Bruce), even as a shadow looms over the compound.  Earlier that day, a worker had died in an accident. Soon, Alboury (Isaach De Bankolé) arrives to claim the body of the deceased who is his brother, but Horn insists he wait until morning, which appears to be an arbitrary delay that sparks a confrontation heavy with tension and buried history.

The performances are striking across the board. Dillon embodies Horn with grit and gravitas, a man hardened by authority and circumstance. Blyth, all restless youth and unsteady masculinity, fills scenes with a mix of loyalty and suppressed desire. McKenna-Bruce, at first all innocence, gradually shades her performance with cynicism and skepticism as Leonie’s position becomes precarious. But the most towering presence is De Bankolé, whose voice and gaze alone carry weight. His performance as Alboury radiates dignity, intensity, and the unyielding demand for respect, both for his brother and for his people.

Adapted from Bernard-Marie Koltès’ play Black Battles with Dogs by Suzanne Lindon, Andrew Litvack, and Denis herself, The Fence retains the structure and dialogue of theater. Monologues unfurl with a sharpness that feels scripted, but Denis imbues them with cinematic force. The exchanges between Horn and Alboury are riveting, every word a blade, every pause a confrontation. The tension is palpable, the sense of importance unavoidable. Yet because of this fidelity to its theatrical roots, the film also feels small, bound by the confines of its dramatic form.

That tension between scale and scope is sharpened by Éric Gautier’s cinematography. His wide frames capture the beauty of the land, the expanse of sky and earth, yet the characters remain locked inside fences, both literal and metaphorical. The clash between theatrical dialogue and cinematic image becomes its own source of unease.

Denis also weaves The Fence into her larger body of work. The homoerotic undercurrents between Cal and Horn echo Beau Travail, with Cal’s jealous longing for Horn becoming more pronounced once Leonie arrives. In White Material and her other films, Denis examined the collapse of colonial families in Africa and historical colonialism; here she critiques its modern continuation. The Fence is not about empire soldiers or plantation owners but about corporations and construction companies that consume land, resources, and lives for profit, with European managers who treat the local population as disposable. It is colonialism transformed into corporate mode, and Denis spares no critique.

In this sense, The Fence becomes a revealing counterpoint to another masterwork at Toronto, Lucrecia Martel’s Nuestra Tierra. Both films, made by two of the greatest female filmmakers, confront the persistence of colonialism in contemporary forms. Martel turns to law and testimony, Denis to theater and confrontation, but both insist on the same truth:  the colonial project is not past but present, still destroying families, cultures, and lives. Denis has always made films that confront desire, power, and history. The Fence continues this tradition. It may be bound to its theatrical origins, but in its performances, its themes, and its gaze, it remains a sensuous, riveting, and deeply political work. Denis once again proves that she is not only one of cinema’s greats, but one of its most vital critics of the world we live in.