It may occur to you that this French film’s take on infidelity is very French. Fanny Ardant, who reminded me of Rene Russo, plays Caroline, the adulterous one here, a prematurely retired dentist who takes up with a thirtysomething computer instructor (Laurent Lafitte) at Bright Days Ahead, a kind of activity center that gives seniors a chance to brush up on acting, pottery, and ping-pong. It seems that Julien, the instructor, is having trouble with his teeth, and before long they’ve filled each other’s cavities. Caroline’s husband (Patrick Chesnais) seems nice enough, but Caroline is in need of something new in her life.
Director Marion Vernoux casts no implied moral judgments on her characters, presenting Caroline’s infidelity, and Julien’s own casual attitude (he has other lovers; she accepts that, mostly), without elaborate justifications. Emphasizing temperament over dramatic tension, she deals with the emotional fallout from the affair in a rather tidy
way, quite the opposite of, for example, the American thriller Unfaithful. The movie’s setting in the Calais area (northern France) sort of suits the film; the area lacks the ornate architecture of Paris or the lushness of the south. Its plainness matches these characters who, notwithstanding their deceptiveness, display a minimum of guile.
Most evidently, it’s a role Ardant can sink her teeth into, and she’s particularly effective in the film’s most flirtatious scenes. Surprises do not abound here, but that may be enough of a reason to watch.
IMDb link
viewed 4/23/12 7:30 pm at Gershman Y [PFS screening]
Showing posts with label northern France. Show all posts
Showing posts with label northern France. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 4, 2014
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Welcome to the Sticks (**3/4)
Upon the U.S. opening of Intouchables, reportedly the second
most popular homegrown film in French history, I became curious about
this comedy, which is number one. It turns out to be a genial,
middlebrow comedy about a Post Office supervisor (Kad Merad) whose
scheme to get transferred to a nice seaside locale backfires. Instead,
his destination turns out to be a small town called Bergues in the most
northern part of France. The comedy largely rests upon the premise that
the French (or, at least, ones from more southerly parts) think of the
North as some awful backwater where the natives can barely speak and
where it’s so cold you need parkas in the summer. The supervisor’s wife,
with whom he’s been having marital issues, certainly thinks so, and
decides to stay behind in the South with their son.
And so, alone, the husband moves, finds the locals peculiar but extremely friendly, the town charming, and so on, meanwhile telling his wife it’s as awful as imagined. A quick Google search would, at the very least, convinced her that the place at least had some visual charm, and that the climate wasn’t awful, but never mind. A lot of the humor stems from linguistic subtleties, including the unusual dialect and occasionally incomprehensible pronunciations. The subtitles in the version I watched did an excellent job of conveying the many such misunderstandings, though it’s the kind of thing where it’s probably funnier if you know the language. This might be one reason the film wasn’t widely released theatrically outside of French-speaking places, despite its success there. However, in its way it says as much about French culture as its more highbrow kin, something like what an Adam Sandler movie might say about a certain sort of American sensibility. (For one thing, it says that the French will accept a bald guy in a leading role.) By no means is this a great film—the hero’s turn from snobby jerk to one of the fellas takes like five minutes—and the humor is mostly middling, but it was fun to watch. The climactic scene in which the wife inevitably arrives for a visit did make me laugh despite it being pretty ridiculous. The director, incidentally, is Dany Boon, who plays the genial, still-living-with-his-mom postman.
viewed 6/2/12 via streaming video and reviewed 6/3/12
And so, alone, the husband moves, finds the locals peculiar but extremely friendly, the town charming, and so on, meanwhile telling his wife it’s as awful as imagined. A quick Google search would, at the very least, convinced her that the place at least had some visual charm, and that the climate wasn’t awful, but never mind. A lot of the humor stems from linguistic subtleties, including the unusual dialect and occasionally incomprehensible pronunciations. The subtitles in the version I watched did an excellent job of conveying the many such misunderstandings, though it’s the kind of thing where it’s probably funnier if you know the language. This might be one reason the film wasn’t widely released theatrically outside of French-speaking places, despite its success there. However, in its way it says as much about French culture as its more highbrow kin, something like what an Adam Sandler movie might say about a certain sort of American sensibility. (For one thing, it says that the French will accept a bald guy in a leading role.) By no means is this a great film—the hero’s turn from snobby jerk to one of the fellas takes like five minutes—and the humor is mostly middling, but it was fun to watch. The climactic scene in which the wife inevitably arrives for a visit did make me laugh despite it being pretty ridiculous. The director, incidentally, is Dany Boon, who plays the genial, still-living-with-his-mom postman.
viewed 6/2/12 via streaming video and reviewed 6/3/12
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