Tag: french cinema

Film by Ezekiel Yu
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A still from Orson Welles's "The Immortal Story," with a figure in high contrast silhouette, staring at a woman lying down, as reviewed by film critic Ezekiel Yu for the automachination literary magazine.

Remembered Depths: Reviewing Orson Welles’s “The Immortal Story” (1968)

A couple years ago I reviewed “The Other Side of the Wind”, the last film released under the name of Orson Welles. It is an absolute tour de force, and the crowning jewel in the career of a man who may very well be America’s greatest director. However, a considerable portion of “The Other Side of the Wind” was completed after Welles’s death in 1985, and though the posthumous production found guidance from the notes he left behind, and one could state with reasonable confidence that their efforts conformed close enough to the spirit of Welles’s direction that overall credit still belongs to him, its chimeric nature makes it difficult to say whether or not Welles himself would have approved of the final cut.

There is, however, no such difficulty with Welles’s 1968 drama “The Immortal Story”, which truly counts as the last fictional feature he directed, from start to finish, and released to the public while still living. It was initially made for French television, and issues with distributors and censors (par for the course, with Welles) bungled its post-production and subsequent premiere so badly that 1) the film played only for a limited time in select European theaters, and 2) certain critics, particularly in Great Britain and the States, rated it poorly enough that it failed to cross over to Anglophone audiences. As a result, The Immortal Story languished in relative obscurity for decades until it was picked up by The Criterion Collection and given a DVD/Blu-ray release in 2016, though to this day I’d wager no one outside of cineastes and Welles devotees are familiar with its existence. […]

Film by Ezekiel Yu
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A shot from Coralie Fargeat's "The Substance", where Demi Moore's character is looking into the mirror.

Control Your Self: on Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance” (2024)

If you could be younger, sleeker, and 10x more desirable, would you be? To be fair, it’s something of a non-question, because simply on its face, I feel that most of us would answer with a simple Yes. However, since reality is the way it is, and we must suffer its constraints, we also understand that beyond the impossibility of reversing time and age, even if some midnight daemon were to offer us this option, such things always come at a price. Wisdom, then, compels us to say No—but there is always, behind that No, the Yes which tickles our desires and pays little heed to the caution of wisdom, or the concept of constraint.

In Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance (2024), the offer comes in the form of a futuristic serum that creates, from your body-stuff, a younger, more attractive duplicate. The only price, it seems, is a somewhat tedious process in which each version, as it lives out its allotted portion of days, must tend to the vegetative state of the other. Supplied are feeding tubes and thick needles. Time, again, is split between the forms. A certain level of, according to its makers, “respect” is required. And then you get to be beautiful. […]

Film by Ezekiel Yu
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A stylized film still from Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s "Amélie" (2001), depicting her surprise as she enters a room.

Quality Charm: Reviewing Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s “Amélie” (2001)

In rewatching the 2001 hit French romantic comedy Amélie, I thought about how if Wes Anderson wasn’t so obsessed with precious, dollhouse-like formality (however visually pleasing) and rendering his characters as mannequin-like as possible, he’d probably be making films like this one.

Or not. They are, to be fair, different filmmakers, but many of the Andersonian hallmarks—repeated 4th wall breaks; hyperfocus on the lives of oddballs; distinct visual panache—appear in Amélie, and it’s hard not to think of Anderson when the deadpan over-voice begins his narration or when a character turns to the camera and makes some humorous aside. Anderson’s reputation in world cinema has reached something of a zenith, as well (whereas Jeunet’s has dipped considerably), so he’s in the zeitgeist heavily enough to inspire comparison.

But the main difference between the films (that I’ve seen) of Jeunet and Anderson is that no matter how quirky and self-aware Jeunet’s style is, his characters still smack of reality. Anderson’s for the most part, and at least post Bottle Rocket, do not. And while both directors prioritize a winsome attitude, whenever depth is attempted in Amélie the film never strains, lightly balancing poignance and whimsicality while Anderson’s attempts at deeper meta-fiction (I’m thinking of moments from his recent Asteroid City, specifically) more often fall flat on their face. […]

Film by Gabriel Massó
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A shot from Robert Bresson's "L'Argent", depicting the protagonist (Christian Patey) being confronted about his counterfeit 500-franc note in a restaurant.

Less Is More: On Robert Bresson’s “L’Argent” (1983)

Robert Bresson is a master ascetic. In no other filmmaker’s oeuvre is value more clearly added by subtraction. In 1956’s A Man Escaped, he sets most of the narrative within the confines of a prison cell. He employs little music, no flashy shots, and no sophisticated editing techniques. Still, he manages to craft a more compelling experience than most prison-break movies because he does not tell his audience what to feel or try to distract them with excessive stimuli. What propels Bresson’s films to greatness is what he does not do. His refusal to partake in certain conventions shows viewers the superfluity of these tropes and how much more interesting it can be to play around them. This is an approach he never veered away from throughout his career, and which he refined in 1983’s L’Argent, a film detailing the events caused by the passing on of a counterfeit bill, and one of the best swan songs in cinema history.

As L’Argent begins, a young man from a well-off family (Marc Ernest Fourneau) enters his father’s study to request his monthly allowance. When he asks for more, his parents refuse, so the kid attempts to pawn his watch to a friend, who gives him a forged 500-franc note. The viewer is immediately struck by the performers’ unusual acting style. Bresson preferred to think of his actors as “models,” non-actors who deliver each line with a poker face, defying the scenery-chewing approach prominent in most films. One would be tempted to call these performances wooden were it not for the fact that this approach allows the audience to imbue character motivation and engage with the narrative on a more intimate level. This is the film’s first example of how the French auteur adds depth to his work by simply abstaining from what most filmmakers are doing. […]

Film by Ezekiel Yu
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A stylized shot from Robert Bresson's "Lancelot du Lac", portraying the king, queen, and standing soldiers.

Craft & Cutting: On Robert Bresson’s “Lancelot du Lac” (1974)

The violence that opens the film will, of course, be mirrored in the end. It is portrayed in graphic detail, with the distance one might expect from Robert Bresson. It is austere, yes, and almost hilariously so: can a beheading, complete with a great spurt of too-red blood, be shown more matter-of-factly? The sequence is mechanical in its depiction: armored knights in a forest slay each other, and ride their steeds through the same forest. Corpses are strung up on trees, or burned, and churches ransacked. Bresson’s camera drives these faceless warriors again and again through the backdrop of their carnage. The repetitions seem to set up the inevitability dogging the film’s primary characters, who should be familiar to anyone acquainted with Arthurian lore. And the trees, which vertically stake the frame together—their tightness creating a cloistering effect for the figures within—will echo throughout the film in the reappearance of other lines, among which those aforementioned figures continually stare, as if entranced by the narrative they cannot help but dutifully enact. […]

Film by Jessica Schneider
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A stylized shot from Krzysztof Kieślowski's "The Double Life of Veronique", depicting Veronique (Irene Jacob) being kissed by her lover.

Feeling Invites the Reason: On Krzysztof Kieślowski’s “The Double Life of Veronique” (1991)

Have you ever felt that your life, while real in the most personal sense, could also exist simultaneously elsewhere, even if lived by some other person? Just what might that entail? In my youth, I’d often imagine living in France—perhaps I’d have moved there after living as an exchange student, but then, I’d remember the emotion that brings me back to the familiar. And while it is easy to romanticize, one must remember that wherever this imaged place and person resides, that the same problems will exist there—perhaps not in degree, but in kind.

Krzysztof Kieślowski’s The Double Life of Veronique is indeed a film of feeling. In fact, this is how Roger Ebert opens his review: ‘Here is a film about a feeling. Like all feelings, it is one that can hardly be described in words, although it can be evoked in art. It is the feeling that we are not alone, because there is more than one of us. We are connected at a level far, far beneath thought. We have no understanding of this. It is simply a feeling that we have.’ He chooses the word feeling, and while I don’t disagree, my instinct wants to instead reach for the word intuition, which is somewhat similar, but evokes more of the body—taste, touch, sensation. Within this film, that which goes on is rarely stated, but implied. […]

Film by Jessica Schneider
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A shot from René Laloux’s La Planète sauvage (Fantastic Planet) of a Draag falling asleep next to an Om child.

Ethereal Circle: On René Laloux’s “La Planète sauvage” (“Fantastic Planet”, 1973)

There are some animated films that are not made for kids. In fact, some are not even made for most adults, and this may be one of them. So, let us not be mistaken that René Laloux’s Fantastic Planet (La Planète sauvage) is, on all accounts, a savage and violent tale where humans (called Oms) are nothing more than tiny animals forced to bend to the whims of larger, more ‘sophisticated’ creatures, called Draags. Within this post-apocalyptic world, the Draags rule and humans at best are regarded as nothing more than pets and at worst, they are vicious vermin deserving of extermination.

Fantastic Planet opens with a frightened human (Om) mother running with her baby. She appears terrified, and in her attempt to find safety, she climbs up a hill, only to then be pushed down by some large, blue hand. Once more, she attempts to climb, and is pushed down again. Still clutching her baby, the hand then flicks her several feet away. Suddenly, the blue fingers lift and drop her, wherein the force of the fall inevitably kills her. ‘What a shame. We can’t play with it anymore,’ says a group of three Draag children. Following that, a young Draag child and her Draag leader father approach the scene. The Draag child (Tiwa) asks if she can keep the orphaned baby Om as a pet. ‘Why is he crying, father?’ she asks. ‘He must be scared. Or hungry,’ her father replies. He allows her to keep the baby Om, but instructs, ‘You must take care of that animal.’ […]

Film by Jessica Schneider
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The priest in Robert Bresson's "Diary of a Country Priest", played by Claude Laydu, looking down in his room with a crucifix hanging to his left.

A World of Green Trees: Robert Bresson’s “Diary of a Country Priest” (1951)

Robert Bresson is a director who does not veer from the suffering a character must undertake at the cruelty of others. This is most prominent in The Trial of Joan of Arc, Mouchette, and Au Hasard Balthazar where we witness some being—be it person or animal—that is beaten under the brunt of some hostile society. Within all three films, each ends in dying or death. No one seems to have any empathy for the one suffering. Yet within Diary of a Country Priest, the ‘little priest’ as he is condescendingly referred to, undergoes very much the same. Unlike the pastor in Ingmar Bergman’s Winter Light, the priest’s faith remains unwavering, as he desperately claims to need prayer like ‘oxygen in his blood.’

The priest, played by Claude Laydu, is somber, morose, and moves about quietly and helplessly. His illness leaves him physically weak. He only smiles once in the film, and that is when he is on a motorcycle. Roger Ebert notes that this is the moment that perhaps rekindles his childhood. Memories of his youth, when there must have been an earlier joy. He has chosen this vocation on purpose, but for what purpose is this? Has Christ abandoned him just as well, as he remains in this otherwise small, petty, country town? Meanwhile, the locals leave threatening notes ordering him to leave. […]