“Louder than Bombs”

Rated R

**

Opens today at Kahala 8

Joachim Trier has quickly established himself as one of Europe’s boldest stylists with his first two features — 2006’s “Reprise” and 2011’s “Oslo, August 31st,” memorable, deeply moving films that achieve a rare balance between formal experimentation and stirring emotional content.

But the Norwegian writer-director delivers a miss with his first English-language film, “Louder Than Bombs.”

It has been three years since acclaimed war photographer Isabelle Reed (Isabelle Huppert in an enigmatic, sphinxlike turn) died in a car accident. Happiest when dodging bullets in the Middle East, Isabelle would wilt and shrink into a depression whenever she returned to her adoring husband, Gene (Gabriel Byrne), and their two sons, Jonah (Jesse Eisenberg) and Conrad (Devin Druid).

A retrospective exhibition of Isabelle’s work has kicked up a host of raw emotions for the three people she left behind. Trier presents their grief as case studies and goes on to explore how each person’s memories present a different aspect of Isabelle.

“Louder Than Bombs” is made up of an overwhelming mass of flashbacks. Trier fails to weave them organically into the fabric of the story, instead taking awkward, contrived timeouts from the action.

The film is a ponderous, overwrought meditation on grief, loss, guilt, and memory that prods and probes its characters more like lab rats than living, breathing creations.