Film Review
Undeterred by the lukewarm reaction to his debut feature
Nos résistances
(2011), director Romain Cogitore returns with a somewhat more involving work
which makes effective use of its exotic location whilst telling a story of
real human interest.
L'Autre continent (
Territory of Love) deals honestly with the
tropes of the classic melodrama and, in a way that is highly evocative of
the romantic dramas of François Truffaut, shows us the devastating
impact of an intense love affair on an individual (an independently minded
career woman) who is singularly ill-equipped to deal with its demands.
With some liberal doses of acerbic humour, Cogitore manages to avoid the
saccharine excesses of the Hollywood counterpart to this film, but he tends
to overplay the emotional card towards the end and slips up with a denouement
that is more slushy than it needs to be.
L'Autre continent impresses
most in its leisurely paced first half, with some breathtaking photography
using the raw beauty of Taiwanese setting to endow the film with a delicate
poetry that evinces only the merest hint of the tragedy that is to come.
It is when the action shifts to Paris that the film's credibility takes a
bashing as the story surrenders to conventional melodrama and serves up the
classic weepy ending that feels all too trite and predictable. Strong
performances from the leads Déborah François and
Paul Hamy help to make up for some shortcomings in a script that at times
feels too mechanical and contrived. Their character's inner turmoil
are powerfully conveyed by some remarkably nuanced acting, helped by some
effective camera work which emphasises both the fragility and intensity of
their passionate love affair.
François's character is the most interesting and most well developed
(by contrast, Hamy's character is somewhat lacking in substance). Maria
appears to be the model of the modern woman - intelligent, independent and
free to go wherever her mood takes her. But when she meets Olivier
she realises that the image she has of herself is an entirely false one.
By falling in love a new Maria is revealed to her, and she is at once torn
between her need for freedom and her attachment to someone who on the face
of it appears totally ill-suited for her. What follows is a searingly
poignant erosion of Maria's former certainties and she ends up, like the
rest of us, trapped in a maddening existential maze where love is the one
and only consolation.
© James Travers 2019
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Maria is a free-spirited thirty year-old who travels to southern Taiwan to
complete the book she is working on. Here, in the coastal city of Kaohsiung,
she finds work as a guide for Dutch tourists and meets Olivier, a shy man
of her own age who shares her aptitude for foreign languages. Despite
their very different natures, Maria and Olivier cannot help falling in love
and in no time they are being carried away on a whirlwind romance.
Unwilling to assume the responsibilities of motherhood, Maria deals with
an unplanned-for pregnancy by having an abortion. Not long afterwards,
Olivier begins to show signs of illness and is diagnosed with leukaemia.
Maria is forced to abandon her plans and heads back to France with her lover,
hoping that there is still time to arrest the progress of his life-threatening
disease. As her dreams of literary success come to nothing, Maria can
only watch as the one true love of her life slips from her tender grasp...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.