At the Angoulême Francophone Film Festival, a breath of fresh air on comedy
[ad_1]
Every year, at the end of the summer, the Francophone Film Festival of Angoulême is the meeting place for French cinema. The big family tastes a little respite before the return to the capital and the traffic jams of films. During this 15e edition, from August 23 to 28, the feature films followed one another, which in competition, which in preview, like a warm-up lap before the theatrical release, the reactions of the public in the cinemas of the city center serving as of barometer.
The time of a short week, the city of Charente has found the paradise of full rooms: the festival recorded 52,000 entries, welcomes its co-founder, producer and former agent of stars, the sexagenarian Dominique Besnehard : “We filled up, and the public of my age is back two years after the pandemic. I’m pretty confident, and the production is very, very good, including the popular comedies that are less frank.”, he said. All the films do not yet advance a release date, but the selection of Angoulême gives a trend for the months to come.
On Sunday August 28, the competition jury, chaired by André Dussollier, awarded the highest award (Valois de Diamant) to a first feature film, The worst, by Lise Akoka and Romane Guéret, former casting directors – theatrical release on November 30. Already awarded at Cannes (Un certain regard prize), this French film plunges into the delicate fabric of so-called social cinema and recounts the tormented, even uneasy filming of a fiction in a city of Boulogne-sur-Mer (Pas-de- Calais).
The unforgettable face of Timéo Mahaut
The scenario, written by the directors and by Eléonore Gurrey, promised to be fascinating, questioning the responsibility of the filmmaker when he stages and exposes young people with dented lives. But here the device sins by its excess, the filmmaker (interpreted by the Belgian Johan Heldenbergh) indulging in too much excess for the reflection to really operate. Finally, it is above all the documentary imprint of the project that touches and disturbs us: there is the unforgettable face of a child, Timéo Mahaut, himself from a foster home, scrutinizing the camera, interpreting little Ryan , a hothead, while letting his share of truth filter through (or playing with it?), with his facial expressions, his silences.
Several films selected at Angoulême showed a bit of the same program, with their portraits of fighting women. Some of them turned out to be very good – but the concentration inevitably raises questions: is it a marketing choice, with feminist film on the rise? Dominique Besnehard denies it: “It’s not voluntary, we didn’t want to ride the wave. It was only afterwards that we realized the place occupied by these films.he said.
The titles of the feature films drive the point home, highlighting the first name of the heroine: here is Arlette, by Mariloup Wolfe, the wacky story of a minister of culture in Quebec confronted with the wicked minister of finance; quote Noémie says yes, by Genevieve Albert, on the prostitution of minors, still in Quebec, disappointing film, giving precedence to its aesthetic shock to the detriment of a painting of the middle, which succeeded Savage (2018), by Camille Vidal-Naquet, on male prostitution. There is also Houria, by Mounia Meddour, a drama of resilience in which a young, promising dancer (Lyna Khoudri), will have to rebuild after an accident (released on March 15, 2023). On the same theme, but out of competition, Storm, by Christian Duguay, in a clean and smooth style, follows the destiny of a young girl passionate about horses, who tries to recover from a terrible fall, with the support of her perfect parents – Mélanie Laurent and Pio Marmaï (out December 21).
Let’s quickly go over A woman of our time, by Jean-Paul Civeyrac (released October 5), also out of competition, with Sophie Marceau in the role of a police commissioner, Juliane, who excels at archery. We wonder what time the filmmaker is talking to us about, with this jealous and unhappy cop, who we barely see practicing his profession. Juliane will lose all her resources when she learns that her husband is cheating on her. It goes from glaucous discoveries to improbable spinning mills, all of this treated in a unambiguous mode, bordering on grand-guignol.
“The blank page”, a caustic tale
But let us point out three great discoveries: Annie Anger, by Blandine Lenoir, revisits the history of the Movement for the Freedom of Abortion and Contraception (MLAC), created in France in 1973, before the vote of the Veil law of 1975 – released in theaters on November 30, 2022. Literally transformed, all reserve and shyness, Laure Calamy embodies Annie, a worker in a mattress factory. Married, pregnant with a second unwanted child, she ends up one day entering an antenna of the MLAC… A film of “general public utility”.
Another favorite for The Blank Page, by Murielle Magellan (theatrical release August 31), burlesque portrait of a young woman (Sara Giraudeau) who is losing her memory – adapted from the eponymous comic strip by Boulet and Pénélope Bagieu (Delcourt/Mirages). Behind its “Amelie Poulain” side, this tale coupled with a romance (Pierre Deladonchamps like a lunar Pierrot) turns out to be more caustic than it seems. When a person absolutely does not know who they are anymore, but tries to deceive them (at work, in love and in family), it gives explosive situations…
Finally, hats off to women of the square, by Julien Rambaldi – theatrical release on November 16. The presence of the thundering Eye Haïdara, already spotted in socialism movie (2010), by Jean-Luc Godard, then in The sense of celebration (2017), by Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache, is not for nothing in the success of this comedy for the general public. Sort of “Jackie Brown” from the Porte de Clignancourt, the gun less, Angèle, of Ivorian origin, leaves her little tricks and the outskirts of Paris for a nanny position in a wealthy Parisian family (Léa Drucker, absent mother, overwhelmed by her work).
After the “cultural” shock, Angèle the big mouth will become indispensable to all, dynamiting the codes, including that of work, fighting to do justice to her comrades babysitters exploited, most of foreign origin, maintained in ” sub-France”. A hilarious film, even in its excesses, which delighted the public. It’s pretty rare, and it’s good news, that the more serious, documentary-like subjects can blow big bubbles in the pot of a comedy.
[ad_2]
Source link
