Film Review
The intimate relationship between an artist and his muse is a subject
that has been amply explored in literature and film, but rarely with
the depth of feeling and insight that Jacques Rivette offers up in his
remarkable
La Belle noiseuse,
one of the highpoints of his career and a landmark of French
cinema. Despite its somewhat daunting length (the film runs to
four hours, although there is a shorter version entitled
Divertimento that comes in at just
over two hours), this is a truly beguiling film that draws you into the
world of the dedicated artist and leaves a lasting impression.
After receiving the Grand prix du jury at the 1991 Cannes Film
Festival, the film garnered widespread critical acclaim and was a
notable commercial success. Helped by the recent popularity of
La Bande des quatre,
La Belle noiseuse heralded
Rivette's return as a leading French film auteur after several years on
the margins. Along with his Nouvelle Vague contemporaries
Jean-Luc Godard, Eric Rohmer and Claude Chabrol, Rivette would occupy
an important place in the auteur wing of French cinema over the next
decade.
Taking as his inspiration a short story by Honoré de Balzac
entitled
Le Chef-d'oeuvre inconnu
(first published in 1831), Rivette and his screenwriters Pascal
Bonitzer and Christine Laurent craft a meticulous study on the
relationship between life and art that is profound, insightful and
totally absorbing. As on several of his earlier films (notably
his gargantuan
Out 1), Rivette gradually
developed the story and the characters with the actors in the course of
shooting the film, with the result that the film has a natural, organic
feel, every moment looking as if it is a real, lived experience rather
than merely a filmed recording of an actor's interpretation of a
writer's idea. The film unfolds at a pace that most of today's
directors would consider unacceptably sluggish, and yet it seizes the
attention and captivates in a way that much of modern cinema singularly
fails to do, simply because what it shows us is utterly fascinating -
the creative process in operation. The only other film like it is
H.G. Clouzot's
Le Mystère Picasso
(1956).
How quickly we forget that the people on the screen are well-known
actors with massive careers behind or ahead of them. Michel
Piccoli
is Edouard Frenhofer,
an artist consumed by his passion for art and Emmanuelle Béart
is Marianne, a succulent muse
willing to surrender herself body and soul to Frenhofer's art, almost
as a sacrificial victim. What connects these contrasting
characters is an almost morbid commitment to the truth - the prize
which great art demands and which life must hold onto if it is to be
truly meaningful. The relationship between the artist and his
muse is far from passive; it is a symbiotic two-way transfer, each
inspiring the other in his or her personal craving for
authenticity.
La Belle noiseuse
is a unique piece of cinema, one that evokes the mysteries of art and
life and shows how intimately related these two are, each lending
meaning to the other as they feed on and replenish the human spirit.
© James Travers 2002
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Next Jacques Rivette film:
Jeanne la Pucelle I - Les Batailles (1994)
Film Synopsis
A young Parisian artist, Nicolas, arrives in provincial France with his girlfriend, Marianne,
to visit a reclusive, once great artist, Edouard Frenhofer. Nicholas and his art
dealer Porbus persuade Frenhofer to complete his last great painting,
La Belle Noiseuse
, with Marianne as his model. When she finds out she has been bartered in this
way, Marianne is furious, but realises she can repay Nicholas in kind by accepting the
contract. Frenhofer's wife, Liz, also begins to resent what has happened, but then she
was the original model for the painting...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.