Guy de Maupassant (1982)
Directed by Michel Drach

Film Review

The works of the prolific 19th century French writer Guy de Maupassant have provided a rich vein for cinema.  Among the numerous adaptations of Maupassant's novels and short stories are such enduring classics as Jean Renoir's Partie de campagne (1936), Christian-Jaque's Boule de suif (1945) and Alexandre Astruc's Une vie (1958).  By all accounts, Guy de Maupassant's life was every bit as rich and colourful as his stories, so you would think he'd be an easy subject for a biopic.  Michel Drach's attempt to cinematise the life of France's master of the short story makes a spirited effort to play the joie de vivre of Guy de Maupassant's public life off against the private desolation of his declining years.  The idea presumably was to stress the contradictory nature of the writer's life, and Drach might have pulled it off if he he hadn't managed to tangle himself up in his artistic pretensions.  The result is a colourful but somewhat messy affair that is more likely to appeal to devotees of lurid art-house porn than literary enthusiasts.

One-time assistant to Jean-Pierre Melville, Michel Drach was one of the more idiosyncratic and independently minded French film directors of the Nouvelle Vague generation.  A man with strong political convictions, he is perhaps best known for the conscience film he made prior to this, Le Pull-over rouge (1979), which helped to galvanise support for the abolition of the death penalty in France.  With its lavish production values and big name cast, Guy de Maupassant sets itself apart from Drach's earlier work and feels like a crazy aberration, a classic example of a serious director over-reaching himself and failing to come to grips with his subject matter.  The film is not without interest and it does have some obvious artistic merits (not least of which are a sublime score by Georges Delerue and a strong performance from Simone Signoret, heartrending in her last big screen role), but as a tribute to the life of a great author it is woefully inadequate.

Guy de Maupassant is almost as famous for his libertine proclivities as he was a writer, and the film certainly doesn't gloss over this side of his character.  The narrative has barely gotten underway before the writer (unconvincingly played by an over-made up and miscast Claude Brasseur) has started indulging his carnal appetites with a bevy of beauties, including one (played by Miou-Miou) who seemingly has a chronic aversion to wearing any kind of clothing (at least she has the decency to keep her stockings on when she gets boating on the Seine).  In an early screen role, a strip-teasing Catherine Frot reveals just about everything she has to offer (which is more than you dare hope) and Véronique Genest gets even more of the full-frontal nudity treatment, in scenes that include a lesbian romp with the ever-nubile Miou-Miou.  This relentless strip-a-thon is not helped by Claude Brasseur's recurring bouts of nudity - these are likely to put you off eating pork for life.  Thankfully, the rest of the cast manage to keep their clothes on for the duration (they probably had better agents), otherwise the result would have ended up looking like a mass orgy in an abattoir or, worse, a film by Jean Rollin.

All this may sound like low-grade porn but it is hard to attach such an epithet to a film that so brazenly applies a Proustian approach to its narrative, with fragments of Maupassant's past life thundering into his present consciousness like bullets into a porcelain vase, accompanied by some bizarre flights of fancy, as the unhappy writer's physical and mental health go into a terminal tailspin.  Whilst it doesn't conceal or make up for the obvious lack of character depth, this abrupt gallivanting between real and imagined realities, past and present, works surprising well, and Drach derives some poignancy by juxtaposing the writer's exuberant youth with the abject misery of his final months (it scarcely seems credible, given his tremendous output, that Guy Maupassant lived such an active life and died at the age of 42). 

The Belle Époque that we recognise from the author's stories is authentically recreated, so that the world we see is unmistakably that of Guy de Maupassant, complete with picturesque romps by the seaside (looking as if they painted by Auguste Renoir), lavish society parties and excursions to squalid backstreet whorehouses.  Yet despite its sumptuous visuals, narrative bravado and strong supporting performances, the film fails to satisfy.  It appears too content to wallow in its tawdry excesses and never achieves a state of coherence - all it amounts to are scattered fragments of a life that don't really add up to much.  Having sat through this two hour plus spectacle of self-conscious artistry drenched in gratuitous flesh-baring and false sentiment, you are left wondering whether the film has said anything meaningful about the life and character of one of France's greatest writers.

Film Synopsis

In the summer of 1891, at the height of his fame, Guy de Maupassant begins to lose his mind.  Unable to complete his latest novel, L'Angélus, he falls victim to severe headaches and frightening hallucinations that cause him to think his end is near.  Yet Guy's hold on life is strong and the 41-year-old writer refuses to accept that he is going mad.  Fleeing the salons and brothels of Paris where he led the life of a libertine, Guy takes refuge in a country house at Cannes, his companions in solitude being his faithful valet François and the elderly mother who still does on him.  As he battles against decrepitude and encroaching insanity, Guy recalls his youth and his many female conquests, but realising that his creative powers and libido have both gone forever, he knows that death has already claimed him...