Review of the film Maiwenn “Jeanne Dubarry”

At the box office – the opening film of the Cannes Film Festival, Maiwenn’s costume drama “Jeanne du Barry”. The declarative old-fashionedness of the film seemed Mikhail Trofimenkov its only merit and fatal flaw.

Countess Jeanne Dubarry (1743–1793) has been played exclusively by top-tier stars for the last hundred plus years. From the silent film vamps of Theda Bara in J. Gordon Edwards (1917) and Pola Negri in the great Ernst Lubitsch (1919) to Asia Argento’s ‘tear-off’ in Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette (2006). From the Mexican beauty Dolores del Rio in the film by William Dieterle (1934) to the communist Lucille Ball in the comedy musical Roy Del Ruta (1943) and the quivering Martin Karol in the film of the master of “daddy’s cinema” Christian-Jacques (1954). Now this host has been joined by actress and director Maywenn, who played Jeanne in her own film.

However, why on earth Madame Dubarry became one of the goddesses of film mythology is completely incomprehensible. The illegitimate daughter of a monk and a seamstress, thanks to her beauty and penetrating power, grew from a milliner and a prostitute to a high-flying courtesan and the official mistress of King Louis XV (1710-1774). But her name, unlike the name of her predecessor Madame Pompadour, did not become a household name, although Jeanne could compete with her in wastefulness, and was noted in political intrigues. In general, she was only one of, as they would say in America of the twentieth century, “gold diggers”, albeit more successful than other concubines from the royal harem. Yes, in the heat of the Jacobin terror, she, who had long been “retired”, was beheaded. But you never know who was not cut off in the unforgettable 1790s: for some reason, no one made films about the poet Andre Chenier and the great scientist Antoine Lavoisier.

It could be assumed that Maivenn would saturate the new version of the biography of the “royal whore”, as the shocked courtiers called Jeanne in private, with relevant, progressive meanings. But the film’s hints of relevance are so clumsy that they’re more likely to infuriate progressives.

Young Jeanne is expelled first from the monastery, where she was handed over in order to avoid the fall, for reading erotic prose, and then from a noble family, where she worked as a reader, for a gang with the master’s sons. The offended girl chooses the path of sex services, realizing, as the voiceover kindly informs, “that you can be both a woman and a free person.” A lovely apology for prostitution.

Equally charming is Jeanne’s indignation when, again in voice-over, she “discovers the dark side of the king.” That is, she learns that she is not alone in sharing a bed with Ludovic (Johnny Depp). The delightful naivete of a professional whore.

Off-screen information that Jeanne imposed on the court “a craving for simplicity and a taste for art” remains to be taken for granted. As well as believing in Dubarry’s commitment to multiculturalism. Bought at the Indian slave market, she makes the black boy Zamora her page, spitting on the racist prejudices of the court. Zamor will happily make a career at court, which is not surprising. In Russia of the 18th century, the grown-up African and African women also fit perfectly into the Petersburg society. But Zamor – again this off-screen voice – will betray his patroness in a revolutionary time.

The voice of an abstract narrator is the protagonist of the film, shot on 35mm film, asserting its traditionality, if not old-fashionedness. To say that “Jeanne” is made richly, most beautifully and impressively, means to say nothing. Mass scenes in the halls and parks of Versailles cost a lot. The challenge to the computer profanation of history can only be applauded. But all this luxury only illustrates a simple truth: “Kings can do everything, but, whatever you say, not one, not one king can marry for love.”

The world has never seen such a quivering love as the love of Louis and Jeanne. Despite his “dark side”, the king is a touching old man (by the standards of the era), who has found the main and last love of life: how not to shed a tear when Jeanne caresses, despising the mortal danger, a lover dying of smallpox. Johnny Depp, yes, is good: he has matured, resonated, has become somewhat similar to Harvey Keitel and Sergei Bondarchuk.

But the world in which the tragedy of love played out was by no means limited, as in the film, to Versailles and Louveciennes, Jeanne’s estate. Louis remained in history a despot, a bawdy and a loser, who lost the most important French colonies, ruined both the fleet and finances, a toy in the hands of favorites. But vulgar politics do not invade the screen. The authors only sneer at the ridiculous court rituals and are indignant at the hostility of the aristocrats. The story ends with the death of the king and Joan’s excommunication from Versailles. The remaining twenty years of Dubarry’s life are retold in a patter by the same invisible narrator, saying at the end that bad people cut off Jeanne’s head. Of course, I would like to know why such villainy would be possible.