La Mer à boire (2012)
Directed by Jacques Maillot

Film Review

Jacques Maillot's third feature after his well-received Nos vies heureuses (1999) and Les Liens du sang (2008) is this moody social drama which seems highly pertinent for our troubled times, dealing as it does with the uglier side of capitalism and the human cost of corporate greed.  La Mer à boire depicts the David and Goliath battle between a shipyard owner who is determined to save his family business and the corporate giants that have the power to save him or destroy him, depending on what he is prepared to give up.  It is a story that is depressingly familiar and the outcome is all too predictable.  Maillot's film serves to remind us of the staggering inhumanity and injustice the capitalist system is capable of, and how easily lives and careers can be destroyed by the forces of global capitalism.

As well-intended as Maillot's film is, it struggles to say anything profound or original and consequently it doesn't have anything like the impact it should.  Most of the characters are thinly sketched archetypes, much of the dialogue is cliché-laden and fails to ring true, and some of the flights of fancy (including an incongruous excursion to Russia) are distractingly self-indulgent.  The film sometimes comes across as a limp remake of one of Claude Sautet's films from the 1970s - a far cry from the bitterly intense social realism of the Dardenne brothers and Ken Loach.  The film's one saving grace is a knock out central performance from Daniel Auteuil, who brings genuine human feeling and sincerity to a film that is too glossy for its own good.  With his engaging, everyman persona, Auteuil perfectly encapsulates the decent, well-meaning small businessman who puts human interest before profit - the kind of individual who is fast become a thing of the past in our increasingly money-orientated world.

Film Synopsis

Georges Pierret is a shipyard owner who has run into financial difficulty.  As his debts mount, he can no longer turn to his bank for support.  Yet he is determined to save the company to which he has devoted his life and which provides a livelihood to a workforce that he regards almost as his own family.  But times are tough, competition is fierce and Georges's struggle appears increasingly futile...