The 17th Annual Virginia Commonwealth University-University of Richmond French Film Festival is finis, and the tricolor that was snapping so full above the Byrd is down, but the weekend was one of incredible images and Carytown sidewalks bustling with bobbing umbrellas and stylish Frenchwomen all talking together at once, or into their cellular Francophones.
The Saturday-evening reception at the great, columned Scott House was sumptuous yet, despite all the high-powered cinéastes there, not uptight, and quite enjoyable. One had to wend back to the tent enclosure for the full effect, complete with red carpet, to where several local food purveyors were providing fare, including One North Belmont, Café Rustica, A Sharper Palate and Weezie’s. I didn’t know what I was eating half the time, but it was all delicious.
Following are capsule reviews of several films. I didn’t see everything, but many, and as per usual, in a grab-bag festival setting, there are unexpected pleasures next to ambitious disappointments. These pictures will arrive — some of them, anyway — in the coming months, and they may or may not make their way to Richmond.
And what is it with all the slapping in French films?
Nothing blew up and no cars were jumped over a bridge in any of the films I saw, though a museum sank beneath floodwaters.
Deux Jours à Tuer: An interesting premise — man destroys his life over a weekend for reasons that are simply unclear; reminded me at first of David Mamet’s Edmond. But the end seemed rushed and too pat.
Slapping: Party guest v. groping rude birthday honoree, and he slaps her back. Wife v. jerk husband.
15 Ans et Demi: A delightful French take on the tired “teen/parent tried to connect with kid/contemporary issues” subject. This isn’t as gritty or serious or lurid as, say, Thirteen or something by Larry Clark. Instead, we get successful genre-straddling film that rewards a viewer who watches what’s going on in the background action, too.
Slapping: In a fit of unbridled frustration, father slaps daughter, but in a sendup perhaps of this kind of behavior in French films, she then holds up her arms in a defensive posture declaring, "Eight years of aikido!"
L’Aprés-midi de Monsieur Andesmas: A dog comes and goes; a young girl, who seems a bit feral herself, comes and goes; and Miou-Miou arrives, who wanders around and tries to tell the old man about what’s been going on. And there’s a huge buildup to seeing Monsieur Andesmas’ daughter, who is lit and portrayed as though she’s jumped out of a Botticelli. It’s all done to tell a story of infidelity,
Slapping: Unfortunately, none.
Cliente: Writer-director-actress Josiane Balasko adapted this film from her own novel, telling an unusual story about a woman of a certain age and accomplishment who, having no love or sex in her life, decides to at least purchase the sex from a gigolo. She knows nothing about him, but we get to see him as a working-class guy trying to save his wife’s beauty salon. Part comedy of manners, part kitchen-sink melodrama, and all compelling.
Slapping: Wife v. husband, client v. gigolo
Saturday night’s shorts: The best of the six was the amusing and inventive Open the Door, Please, a tribute to Jacques Tatí. It’s about the teenaged, and quite tall, Tatí trying to pose for the class picture. I also enjoyed La Pomme de Newton, about a guy living in a tree who gets coaxed down by a pretty woman; and Welcome to Whitechapel District, in which London’s street signage comes to life to tell the Jack the Ripper story.
Slapping: None. But there was some rope-climbing and animated evisceration.
Magique!: Another effort to bend genres; though filmed in Quebec, this movie about a circus (but without a circus actually performing in it) was brooding and French, despite a precocious cute kid, his very attractive but depressed mother (who looked great even in a beekeeper’s suit) and periodic bursts into folkish-sounding song. The film feature one of my favorite visuals: that of a lit-up circus big top at night and the silhouettes of the acrobats. This was a metaphor for film, and theater, that of the ancient light burning to ward off darkness and despair. But I didn’t like the movie as a whole.
Slapping: None. But it did have a farting trick dog named Mr. Einstein.
Musée Haut, Musée Bas: An exuberant satiric romp through art and culture. Smart, funny and absurd; a film about art museums and high art culture that turned into a cross between Titanic and The Day After Tomorrow and resolved into The Raft of the Medusa tableaux, reminding me of that final floating bio pod at the end of Silent Running, except, in this case, for Civilization, not necessarily Nature.
Art is the transmission of knowledge and information; we know earlier civilizations by surviving architecture, sculpture and paintings. With humor, this film asks the question: What will endure from our own?
Slapping: None. But there is a son-mother throttling for the cause of art.
Fin.
