Even the most ideal families may have their own agonies hidden deep.
(2009) Drama (IFC) Louis-Do de Lencquesaing, Chiara Caselli, Alice de Lencquesaing, Alice Gautier, Manelle Driss, Eric Elmosnino, Sandrine Dumas, Dominique Frot, Antoine Mathieu, Igor Hansen-Love, Elsa Pharaon, Olivia Ross, Jamshed Usmonov, Cori Shim, Yejin Kim, Philippe Paimblanc, Magne Håvard Brekke. Directed by Mia Hansen-Love
For most of us, having it all would have to include a wonderful, loving family, as well as success at doing a job that we loved doing. Sometimes though, that doesn’t always last.
Gregoire Canvel (L. de Lencquesaing) is a film producer who has had some success in the past. Right now he’s got a difficult director with an even more difficult star and the budget is straining at the gills. He’s dealt with that kind of thing before and his family is his safe harbor in stressful times – wife Sylvia (Caselli), eldest daughter Clemence (A. de Lencquesaing, Louis-Do’s real life daughter), Valentine (Gautier) and youngest Billie (Driss).
With his family, he can escape to idyllic homes and memorable holidays. His daughters worship him and his wife, aware in general of the financial difficulties that his production company is facing, supports him and adores him. Gregoire couldn’t have asked for a better family and he knows it.
But even the most loving, supportive family in the world can’t always protect you from calamity and when it comes, his life – and that of his family – takes a decided left turn, leaving pieces to be picked up and wounds to be healed, some of which may never fully do so.
Although perceptive viewers will probably be able to pick up what is to happen, I’m trying to keep it as obscure as I can because when it does occur, it still comes as something of a shock. The event essentially divides the film into two, with one centering on Gregoire and the other on Sylvia and Clemence. Although the second film is clearly the most emotional and memorable of the two, it would lose its impact without the first.
When most directors present a family in crisis in film, generally things get resolved in an hour and a half of screen time but some things cannot be resolved quite so easily, if at all. The consequences of our actions can have lasting repercussions not only on our own lives but on those around us, even on the very periphery. Hansen-Love seems to understand this better than most and uses both stories to drive home the point.
The cast isn’t as well-known in the States as it is in France, but certainly Louis-Do de Lencquesaing has the charisma to transcend language and subtitles. We watch his character slowly unravel, going from a confident, hard-working hustler with a cell phone constantly glued to his ear (sometimes more than one) to a shell of himself, one who no longer has the ability to cope with even the slightest problem. Having seen that kind of thing happen to a man in real life (more than one, in fact) Gregoire’s fall rings true. That we can see it coming and nobody else around him does is truly the tragedy here – often the ones closest to us are the ones we see the least clearly.
This isn’t always an easy movie to watch and if I have a problem with it it’s that the movie ended before the story did, which again is real life – a mini-series probably wouldn’t have been enough. We are drawn to these characters, come to care about them and then poof, they’re gone with so much unresolved. I wanted to know that they were all going to be all right and clearly Hansen-Love doesn’t want you to have a definitive answer on that. Normally, I’m all with that sort of thing but I think the movie did its job too well – when the end credits were rolling I felt frustrated. But at no point did I ever feel that I wasn’t watching a superior film – and this one is.
WHY RENT THIS: A searing emotional drama. Some terrific performances.
WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: I would have liked to see a bit more of how the family coped after the closing credits.
FAMILY VALUES: Some very adult themes, some bad language and some smoking.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: The movie is based on the life of French producer Humbert Balsan.
NOTABLE DVD EXTRAS: None listed.
BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $479,282 on an unreported production budget; I’m thinking this movie broke even at best.
COMPARISON SHOPPING: Ordinary People
FINAL RATING: 7.5/10
NEXT: Mud
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