La Repentie (2002)
Directed by Laetitia Masson

Film Review

La Repentie sees Isabelle Adjani's long awaited return to the big screen after an absence of six years - her last film being Jeremiah Chechik's justly reviled Diabolique (1996).  It is hardly the most inspiring or promising of comebacks - her performance in this unsatisfying hotchpotch of romantic drama and noir-ish crime thriller lacks any kind of emotional quality and serves merely to weaken what would in any case have been a mediocre, badly composed film.

The film's director is Laetitia Masson, who received some critical acclaim for her previous films, En avoir (ou pas) (1995) and À vendre (1998), films with a hard social realist edge and a distinctive visual style.  La Repentie is her fourth film and lacks the cohesion and impact of her previous work; it feels more like Masson is experimenting with cinematic form for the sake of it, rather than trying to create a cohesive and impactful piece of cinema.

The casting of Isabelle Adjani alongside another well-regarded screen actor, Sami Frey, is perhaps the film's strongest suit.  They had previously worked together on Claude Miller's 1983 thriller Mortelle randonnée and have a natural rapport.  The best moments in La Repentie are where these two actors are sharing intimate exchanges of dialogue, although a lacklustre script gives neither much of an opportunity to shine.  Playing Adjani's father is José Giovanni, an important writer and director of the thriller genre in the heyday of the French policier - his credits including such classics as Le Clan des Siciliens (1969) and Deux hommes dans la ville (1973).  Adjani's sister is played by Maria Schneider, best known for her role opposite Marlon Brando in Bernardo Bertolucci's Last Tango in Paris (1972).

Any appeal that La Repentie may have had is pretty much eroded by some annoying artistic indulgences.  The part that most merits the scissors treatment is the boring as Hell sequence near the start of the film where Adjani dances for what seems like an eternity on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice.  This is one of many occasions in the film where a popular music track is inserted and played at maximum volume - not only do the choices of music seem inappropriate, but in virtually every case the narrative flow is torpedoed for apparently no good reason.  For a director of Masson's standing, the film appears shockingly ill-judged and stands apart as the weakest entry in her filmography so far.

Film Synopsis

An aura of mystique surrounds a woman who has just arrived in Nice by train.  Dressed entirely in black and wearing dark glasses, she can hardly help arousing fascination, and yet it is quite evident she does not seek the company of others.  Everything about her cries out that she has a past behind her that she desperately wants to escape from.  So here she is, incognito in a strange town, with a small suitcase in her hand, in search of a new life.  She begins by seeking work at a luxury goods shop, but she is sent away.  Finding a job will not be as easy as she had imagined.

Next we see the same mysterious woman in an exclusive hotel frequented by the more affluent visitors to the town.  Here, she attracts the attention of a debonair middle-aged man who appears to be as solitary and enigmatic as she is.  Like her, he is a man with a past he cannot talk about, and like her he needs someone to help him through his present existential crisis.  But the woman's past is not so easily discarded.  It is pursuing her even now, in the guise of a man who is clearly bent on some malevolent purpose...