Humiliated and complicated – Newspaper Kommersant No. 212 (7413) dated 11/16/2022

Les Choses humaines (Les Choses humaines), a legal drama by Ivan Attal, filmed in the MeToo subgenre, was released. Trying to figure out who is right and who is wrong in the case of rape in a Parisian dump, I became sad Mikhail Trofimenkov.

It’s hard to write a film review when most of the on-screen dialogue boils down to the question of whether the alleged rapist Alexander (Ben Attal) said to the alleged victim Mila (Suzanne Jouanne) the sacramental phrase: “Bitch, suck!” And if the temperamental speech of Mila’s defender ends with an angry cry: “No, Monsieur Farel, no matter what you say, she didn’t finish!” Much more chaste is the classic porn of those that Alexander is fond of than this drama about the mental suffering of the inhabitants of the intellectual quarters of Paris.

Ivan Attal’s struggle for the rights not so much of the women who suffered, as of the men who suffered from women’s slander, turned into obscenity, all the more depressing because this obscenity is verbal, not visual. Obviously, in a courtroom where a rape case is being heard, this is exactly what happens. But the audience is not sitting in the courtroom.

The defendant is a golden boy, a pianist and cinephile, a Stanford student who flew to Paris for a couple of days to attend the presentation of the Legion of Honor to Papa Jean (Pierre Arditi), the famous TV presenter. The boy will be handcuffed just in the morning of the solemn day.

The plaintiff is the daughter of Adam (Mathieu Kassovitz), a roommate of Jean’s mother, a girl from a good, Orthodox Jewish family. Claire’s mother (Charlotte Gainsbourg) is a famous journalist who has earned accusations of far-right sympathies because of the demands for severe punishment of immigrants who raped a girl in the port of Calais. Well, Papa Jean is a gray-haired lion who, after a divorce, lives in a hotel overlooking the Arc de Triomphe and, out of habit, puts everything that moves into a bunk.

The moral of the film is that everything in the world is so complicated that the devil himself will break his leg. That in such a delicate situation as the one played out in the film, psychological, social, religious, and media factors are intertwined in a dead knot. Who would doubt, but is it worth it to fence for the sake of ascertaining such an elementary truth for almost a two and a half hour on-screen garden.

Alexander is the ideal accused as the son of his father, brought up in a sense of his own talent, omnipotence and permissiveness. Mila is the ideal victim as the daughter of her mother, who, more than anything else, cherishes her daughter’s virginity, which she lost a long time ago. “We need to consult with the rabbis,” is the only thing my mother can say to Mila when she tells her about the rape.

Claire is an even more ideal victim, immediately becoming the target of social media harassment. Say, you demanded to severely punish the unfortunate Arab rapists, and for the son of a rapist, I suppose, you will stand up as a wall.

And at the same time, the director fails to arouse the slightest sympathy for any of them – neither Alexander, nor Mila, nor Claire, who was also punished by parting with Adam. Of all the characters, Jean is the most sympathetic. Yes, such an old libertine in the tradition of French libertinage, not intending to renounce them. Moreover, he fell into the trap of love for a young intern, with whom he will unexpectedly make a happy couple. The most honest hero, a true child of the national cultural tradition.

However, he will also have to humiliate himself, repenting for the wrong upbringing of his son. Alexander, in his last word at the trial, will also ask for forgiveness from Mila for humiliating her. Yes, and he himself is humiliated, his future is destroyed. Both Claire and Adam are humiliated, and all the witnesses who spoke at the trial. But, what is most regrettable, the audience of this ponderous and by and large meaningless film is also humiliated.