Film Review
It's been a decade since Yves Angelo directed a film for the cinema,
dividing the critics with his overwrought but intensely humane period
drama
Les Âmes grises
(2005). In the interim he has been busy doing what he does best,
ennobling the films of other directors with his consummate skill as a
cinematographer. For his sixth film as a director, Angelo tackles
a subject that would seem to be unworthy of his talents - a
contemporary drama mistakenly constructed as a far-fetched
psychological thriller. With a script co-authored by
François Dupeyron and a cast headed by Sylvie Testud, it's hard
to see how
Au plus près du
soleil could go wrong, but Angelo, his inspiration visibly
lacking, finds a way.
The main hurdle that Angelo has to overcome is the implausible
storyline that he is presented with. The plot is riddled with
contrivances, which get more noticeable and harder to swallow as the
film progresses. There's a fundamental lack of logic in the way
that all three of the main protagonists behave and they end up looking
like automata on a baroque piece of furniture mechanically playing out
a poignant but somewhat absurd form of Greek tragedy. Even if we
accept the unlikely premise that Sylvie Testud can find out the true
mother of her adopted son in the way the film would have it, it strains
credulity too far that she should, as a respectable magistrate, behave
in the way she does, failing to discharge her professional duties with
blithe disregard for the legal process. It takes an even greater
suspension of disbelief to accept what then happens, the first in a
series of improbable developments that bring the three main characters
together and sets them on a course to what looks like mutually assured
destruction.
Not even Ingmar Bergman could have made much of such a ludicrous
storyline, and even with three gifted lead actors at his disposal Yves
Angelo looks as if he is fighting a losing battle all the way. Of
course, given Angelo's keenly developed visual sense, the film looks
good, but this doesn't disguise the lack of substance beneath the
surface gloss. Sylvie Testud is visibly wasted in a part that
requires her to do little but behave like a crabbily over-protective
mother, and whilst Grégory Gadebois may look convincing in
lawyer's robes, he seems a tad miscast as the husband who appears so
willing to wreck his seemingly idyllic family.
Only Mathilde Bisson, stunningly sensual in her first major screen role
(with a touch of the wild tigress about her), fits the character she
has been allotted, and more than anything it is her alluring presence
that holds our attention, enchanting us even when the film hobbles onto
distastefully Oedipean territory. Even with Bisson on board, and
despite one or two strong scenes which give a glimpse of how much
better the film might have worked as a more naturalistic drama,
Au plus près du soleil never
quite bridges the credibility gap and it leaves you feeling
short-changed - albeit pleased to have encountered a possible future
star in the form of Mlle Bisson.
© James Travers 2015
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Next Yves Angelo film:
Le Colonel Chabert (1994)
Film Synopsis
Sophie is a judge who is presently occupied with the case of Juliette,
a younger woman who is charged with abusing her lover, a man who was
driven to suicide. As she looks into the matter, Sophie makes the
shocking discovery that Juliette is the biological mother of the boy
she adopted some years ago. Sophie has come to regard Léo
as her own son and, fearing that Juliette may take her away from him,
she arranges for her to be convicted for her alleged crime.
Sophie's husband Olivier, also a lawyer, finds his wife's behaviour
incomprehensible and pays Juliette a visit after her release from
prison, keeping from her his real identity. Without Sophie
knowing, Olivier is soon pursuing an affair with Juliette, never
suspecting that the young woman may have a motive for breaking up his
family...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.