Film Review
Marcel Proust's
À la recherche du temps perdu and Julien Duvivier's
Un carnet de bal (1937)
appear to have been the main inspiration for Paul Vecchiali's latest cinematic
offering, an understated drama in which the 86-year-old director plays an
old man raking over the embers of his implausibly full love life.
Le
Cancre is as good an excuse as any to parade a long line of talented
and mostly all-but-forgotten actresses in front of the camera, with Annie
Cordy, Edith Scob, Françoise Arnoul, Françoise Lebrun and Catherine
Deneuve all willing to lend their talents, however briefly, to what may well
be Vecchiali's directorial swansong. Deneuve is barely on screen for
a few minutes, but she redeems a dawdling and somewhat self-indulgent piece
with a short scene that somehow says all that needs to be said about the
pain and cruelty of love. Danielle Darrieux, one of the director's
most imporant muses, is conspicuous by her absence.
Running alongside Vecchiali's obsessive quest for his ideal love is a parallel
story strand in which the old man tries to establish some kind of rapport
with his estranged son, convincingly played by the director's frequent collaborator
Pascal Cervo. It is this part of the film that has more depth and meaning
to it, although Vecchiali's tendency to overwrite his dialogue renders some
scenes flat and clumsily theatrical - a far cry from the sheer brilliance
of his early work, such as
Femme
femmes (1974) and
En haut des marches
(1983).
Le Cancre is hardly an unqualified success but for admirers
of the work of this indefatigable auteur (this is his 26th feature in fifty
years) the film has its rewards. An unexpected musical number and an
appealing mix of deadpan humour and wry reflection on life amply make up
for the occasional longueur and an apparent lack of narrative coherence.
The old Vecchiali magic continues to delight.
© James Travers 2017
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Rodolphe is a man in his eighties who stubbornly insists on continuing to
live on his own at his house in the south of France. Reluctantly, he
agrees to allow his son Laurent, a man in his forties negotiating a difficult
mid-life crisis, to move in with him and ensure he comes to no harm.
The two men have never really got on, and each has good reason for resenting
the other. Throughout his life, Rodolphe has been an inveterate womaniser,
but now he is obsessed with finding the one true love of his life, Marguerite,
whose memory continues to haunt him...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.