A fresh yet familiar feeling is how the aesthetics of The Chronology of Water presents themselves to the audience, a clear hint that the eye behind the camera has seen many films before that have influenced the choices made.
After several short films, Kristen Stewart has made her feature-length directorial debut with The Chronology of Water which premiered at the 78th Cannes Film Festival on May 16, 2025. Her first feature is an adaptation of Lidia Yuknavitch’s autobiographical novel of the same title. Lidia was raised in a dark environment surrounded by abuse from her father and the alcoholism of her mother. A woman with greatness available at the tip of her fingers but ultimately destined for destruction. It seems as though it was the water that could save her, when in truth it is the freedom from literature that eventually does.
The Chronology of Water is a difficult yet intriguing watch. Lidia (Imogen Poots) is a woman who has been through tragic and dark events in her life, but what brings her back from them is her attachment and love for the water. Experienced abuse from her father caused Lidia to become an addict – of all sorts – and this has thoroughly affected her throughout her life. As a competitive swimmer, she flunked out of the college sponsorship due to her alcoholism. Through many relationships, they all seemed to be destroyed by her addictions and vices, those of which her partners could not cope with.
Ultimately, The Chronology of Water explores how an individual’s own traumatic experiences don’t have to hold them back from making the most of their life. Trauma can be repurposed into art, and through Lidia’s bloody history, we are reminded that there are unique occurrences that women and girls experience in their bodies. As with memoirs, The Chronology of Water is full of both the good and the ugly, and Stewart presents this in her film adaptation in more ways than one. Using Yuknavitch’s memoir, the two remind audiences that memory can be fleeting, and reminiscing about what has happened in the past can produce the strangest results. This is felt in the way the film is presented to us – a strong presentation of the messiness of memory and girlhood.
Opening with flickers between shots, voice-overs that do not apply or come from the current scene, an uneasy voice discussing what is to come. All of these methods combined allow for the film to declare itself uncomfortable before even showing the heart. Even though the material is immensely dark and requires a lot from the audience, Stewart’s prior film knowledge allows The Chronology of Water to be presented to the viewer in such a way that the confusion and pain is all part of the process with connecting to the character. The choices made from adapting the memoir into the film remain true to Lidia’s story and experiences. There are moments in the film where the audience will question where the voice is coming from, and it is not until moments later that we hear the exact same thing again that we realize the overlapping is done with a specific purpose in mind. To show how memory can fade over time and become fleeting, perhaps you can never really be entirely sure what truly has happened or when. The proper order of life’s most devastating events could become jumbled, and you may never know, it is getting through the worst of them and coming out the other side that is what’s important.
The Chronology of Water is Stewart’s opening path into feature-length filmmaking as it shows great potential from the artist. It is clear through her choices that Kristen Stewart will choose to direct projects she is passionate about and those that focus on minorities as well. Another queer film for the Cannes Film Festival, one of which does not explicitly need to showcase that its protagonist could be queer. Hopefully, The Chronology of Water receives a wide release in the future, to allow the world to have access to another women’s important story, told from the eyes of a woman passionate about female empowerment and truth.
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