Review: A mesmerizingly vulnerable Angelina Jolie fails to fully redeem 'Couture'

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Set us as preferred In the last decade or so, Angelina Jolie has been on screen less frequently.So when she is — and not in forgettable tentpoles like “Eternals” — it’s worth paying attention.

There seems to be a thoughtful intentionality to the roles she now chooses, almost as if this astoundingly famous woman wants to tell us something vital about herself, offering clues into her understandably guarded personal life.Take 2015’s “By the Sea,” which she wrote and directed.Coincidentally or not, that pained study of marital dissolution, co-starring Jolie’s then-husband Brad Pitt, intersected with the couple’s real-life breakup — not to mention Jolie’s grief over the death of her mother, Marcheline Bertrand.

Two years ago, Jolie portrayed a version of the elusive, emotionally closed-off opera singer Maria Callas in “Maria.” The conception of the role, marked by a dim view of stardom’s suffocating alienation, was something Jolie clearly understood.Moviegoers should be careful not to read too much autobiography into an actor’s creative choices, but Jolie makes such speculation tantalizing, adding additional layers of drama to her films.The intermittently affecting “Couture” feels similarly close to her heart, depicting a filmmaker whose life is interrupted by a cancer diagnosis — a reality Jolie knows all too well.

In 2013, she underwent a preventive double mastectomy over concerns of her likelihood to develop breast or ovarian cancer.(Bertrand died of cancer in 2007.) Knowledge of Jolie’s circumstance will inform a viewer’s reaction to her wounded, resilient performance, but our inherent sympathies can only take French writer-director Alice Winocour’s ensemble piece so far.

Entertainment & Arts Jolie plays Maxine, an American indie director hired to create a flashy opening film f...