Dodin Bouffant (Benoît Magimel) has been trying for two decades to convince Eugénie (Juliette Binoche) to marry him. He is a gastronome of international reputation, considered the “Napoleon of the culinary art”, the equal of the great chefs Carême and Escoffier. She is his cook and his lover. In a final effort, he will meticulously prepare her a meal fit for a queen. We have never seen such a declaration of love, through delicate dishes, in the cinema. Inspired by a novel by Marcel Rouff published in 1924, The Passion of Dodin Bouffant, the opening film of the 52nd New Cinema Festival, is reminiscent of Babette’s Feast in its gastronomic excess. We waltz in the kitchen with Dodin and Eugénie as they prepare a feast for friends, thanks to the fluid camera movements and choreography by Trân Anh Hùng. French quality, in the culinary art (the triple Michelin starred Pierre Gagnaire acted as consultant) and cinematographic, is expressed through this elegant and moving, but academic, didactic and smooth film, which earned the filmmaker the Best Director Award at the most recent Cannes Film Festival.
A fantastic vampire film with black humor, coupled with a touching coming-of-age story, Humanist Vampire Seeks a Consenting Suicide, the first feature film by Ariane Louis-Seize, co-written with Christine Doyon, is a successful balancing act between drama and comedy, on a subject as serious and delicate as suicide. It’s the story of Sasha (Sara Montpetit), a teenager who refuses to give in to her bloodthirsty nature and bite a human being. She just drinks blood through a straw from the sachets available in the family fridge. Her father (Steve Laplante) supports her in her difference, but her mother (Sophie Cadieux) is less forgiving. Sasha is sent by her parents to live with her cousin and, at their insistence, joins a support group for anonymous depressives. There she meets Paul (Félix-Antoine Bénard), a shy boy who cannot find meaning in his life. Sasha offers him a deal. The result is a sensitive and beautiful film, which multiplies metaphors and innuendoes, particularly on the awkwardness and stress of the “first time”. It won Ariane Louis-Seize first prize in the Giornate degli Autori section of the 80th Venice Film Festival a few weeks ago.
The Beast, by Bertrand Bonello, a retrofuturist drama freely inspired by a short story by Henry James dating from 1903, is an elegant and enigmatic, disturbing and anxiety-inducing film, which takes place in parallel universes and variable space-time, with constant back and forth between the past (1910), the present (2014, in fact) and the future (2044). Bonello manages to maintain an atmosphere of disquiet throughout the duration of this sumptuous and glacial film, mysterious and sometimes opaque, which little by little reveals its multiple layers. The story alternates between French and English, Paris and Los Angeles. Léa Seydoux alternately plays a French actress in Hollywood, a pianist married to a doll maker who meets a young Londoner (George MacKay) to whom she revealed a dark presentiment, and a woman who hesitates to escape a purification of his DNA, in order to cut himself off from his feelings. Bonello, to whom the FNC is paying tribute this year, addresses fears linked to the invasion of artificial intelligence or even to the misogynistic culture of incels, with processes which recall in particular certain films by Michael Haneke (Benny’s Video, Funny Games ).
Sofia Coppola’s adaptation of Priscilla Presley’s biography, Elvis and Me, published in 1985, is a subtle and intimate, minimalist and impressionist work, about the emancipation of a woman under the yoke of a pygmalion since the adolescence. A story in perfect harmony with the rest of Sofia Coppola’s filmography, about young women in search of freedom, which rises through its mastery above the fray of Bling Ring, Beguiled and On the Rocks. Priscilla Beaulieu was only 14 years old and Elvis Presley was 10 years older when they met in 1959. It is from that moment, and through the eyes of Priscilla Presley, that Sofia Coppola tells this story of mythical love that today we would describe as toxic. Until the couple separated in 1973. Sofia Coppola made the wise choice to entrust these iconic roles to little-known actors. The Australian Jacob Elordi, who does not attempt to imitate Elvis, exudes an energy that is both touching and terrifying. The American Cailee Spaeny, 25, is completely convincing, both as a smitten 14-year-old girl and as an emancipated 28-year-old woman. She won the Best Actress Award last month at the Venice Film Festival.
Montrealer Alyosha Schneider plays Jonathan, a modern Oedipus who sings more than he speaks, in Music by Angela Schanelec, a very free rereading of the famous Greek myth, presented in competition at the Berlinale last February. Music tells the tragic journey of Jonathan, abandoned shortly after his birth in the Greek mountains, then adopted by the paramedic who found him there. As an adult, while a student, he accidentally kills a young man and is sent to prison where Iro (Agathe Bonitzer), a guard, becomes infatuated with him. The German filmmaker plays with time, blurring the lines and multiplying ellipses. It does not in the slightest adhere to the usual narrative codes and immediately imposes those of Greek tragedy – the stoic and placid performance of the actors is resolutely theatrical. Music is a film of indolent atmospheres and long silences. Alyosha Schneider doesn’t say a single word during the first 30 minutes of the film and the rest of his lines can be counted on the fingers of one hand. It is through music and his songs that his character is expressed in this enigmatic, atmospheric, austere, abstract and frankly demanding film.
A vacation gone wrong becomes the ideal pretext for this burlesque comedy that evokes Roberto Rossellini’s classic. The actress and director Sophie Letourneur (Énorme) forms a particularly credible couple alongside Philippe Katerine who finds one of his best roles in the cinema. Their irresistible chemistry, as well as the often hilarious situations, the dialogues that melt in the mouth and the mockumentary-style staging infuse a constant good humor into this somewhat repetitive story. The duo must also make the trip to Montreal to present the feature film.
After winning the Golden Bear for his breathtaking Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn, Radu Jude offers a new unclassifiable and subversive UFO. By following a young woman who seeks to speak with disabled workers, the enfant terrible of Romanian cinema paints a relentless portrait of neoliberal capitalism and the digital age. The ingenuity of the staging is reminiscent of the Godard of the good old days, the cynical humor hits the mark and the references flow freely. The whole thing may drag on, but it is a huge, brilliant and necessary political satire.
A mother hires professional actresses to fill the absence of her two eldest daughters. This is the starting point of this exceptional film by Kaouther Ben Hania (The Man Who Sold His Skin), which is intended to be both powerful cathartic therapy and a fascinating reflection on cinema. The hybrid device between reality and fiction allows us to grasp the full complexity of this woman – and of her country, Tunisia – who evolves in an environment where violence and freedom are often linked. A moving work.
