Anne-Sophie Bailly's assured feature debut My Everything examines the difficulties faced by a fortysomething single mother, who sets about supporting her adult son as he embarks on the byzantine journey that is parenthood. Written and directed by Bailly (En travail, Acte cent: la relève), the film presents a narrative that deftly intertwines gentleness with resilience, reflecting both the harsh realities of caregiving and the intricacies of a life-changing challenge. At the centre of My Everything is Mona, portrayed by the superb Laure Calamy, best known for Call My Agent! and her César-nominated turn in Her Way.
My Everything follows Calamy's Mona, a woman working as an aesthetician, as she attempts to get to grips with the news that her son Joël (Charles Peccia) is to become a parent with his girlfriend Océane (Julie Froger). The story unfolds with an apt sense of realism, as Mona struggles with the implications of both her own motherhood and Joël's impending fatherhood. Joël and Océane, both living with intellectual disabilities, do their best to prepare themselves for the joys and worries of raising a baby, while Mona confronts her own fears regarding the complexities of parental love and responsibility.
The film sensitively explores the difficult issues connected with such a scenario, and Peccia, whose only other feature film credit is a bit part in Galatéa Bellugi-starrer Her & Him & the Rest of the World, gives a wonderful, nuanced performance alongside seasoned pro Calamy. Belgian actor Geert van Rampelberg's role as Mona's love interest Frank adds another layer to the film, providing a perspective on the external influences that affect the family dynamic. Filmed entirely in and around Dunkerque, My Everything sees Bailly fully exploit the Nord-Pas-de-Calaisian landscape's ability to convey various states of emotion.
Bailly's film also emphasises the importance of an inclusive narrative that acknowledges the experiences of all characters, especially those with disabilities, and it stands as a compelling examination of the human condition, familial bonds, and maternal love. In other hands, My Everything could easily have been reduced to a rote melodrama, but Bailly's control and sureness of touch—along with the performances of Calamy, Peccia, Froger and Van Rampelberg—ensure that the film is never anything less than an absorbing, compassionate and plausible work, one that belies its director's relative inexperience.
Having strayed from his home turf for 2021's largely Paris-set France, director Bruno Dumont once again finds himself on the familiar territory of the Opal Coast with The Empire (curiously, Dumont's Outside Satan was filmed under the same working title). As with Outside Satan, The Empire is concerned with the age-old battle between good and evil. Yet despite sharing the same broad theme and setting, the two films are very different from one another, with Outside Satan's Bressonian austerity nowhere in evidence as The Empire firmly aligns itself with the absurdist comedies Dumont has been making for the past decade. Out of Dumont's post-Camille Claudel 1915output, only 2019's Jeanne can be classed as a mostly "straight" film, but even that punishing, rigorous exercise was the sequel to a deranged heavy metal musical centring on Joan of Arc.
Dumont's shift into comedy began with the 2014 miniseries Li'l Quinquin, which kicked off a loose trilogy that is now capped with The Empire (in between came a second TV series, Coincoin and the Extra-Humans). These three works are linked by a pair of bumbling cops, Van der Weyden (Bernard Pruvost) and Carpentier (Philippe Jore), who over the course of the past ten years have been investigating increasingly bizarre crimes. Coincoin and the Extra-Humans introduced a sci-fi element to proceedings, and The Empire sees Dumont make the leap to full-bore science fiction, with his latest film playing as a Ch'timi take on Star Wars, lightsabres and all. As far as Dumont's oeuvre is concerned, it has been posited that The Empire is a mix of Ma Loute and The Life of Jesus, but it is difficult to see much of the latter—barring the general locale—in this light divertissement.
At its most basic level, The Empire pits two alien factions against each other as they vie to take control of Earth. The Queen (Camille Cottin) spearheads the benevolent 1s, while Beelzebub (Fabrice Luchini) is the leader of the nefarious 0s; each side has taken a foothold in a small fishing village by inhabiting the bodies of locals. Thus, 0-fuelled fisherman Jony (Brandon Vlieghe) has fathered a baby who, it is foretold, will lead the dark side to triumph—sound familiar? Jane (Anamaria Vartolomei) works on behalf of the 1s, and is devoted to preserving mankind; she has a sidekick in the form of Rudy (Jeanne's Julien Manier), while Jony is backed up by Line (Lyna Khoudri). Although these otherworldly beings should have loftier matters on their minds, their earthly bodies serve as a major distraction—particularly when opposing numbers Jane and Jony develop a mutual attraction.
Just as France saw its male lead replaced prior to the start of filming, Dumont was forced into recasting no less than three of The Empire's main roles, with Vartolomei, Khoudri and Cottin replacing Adèle Haenel, Lily-Rose Depp and Belgian actress Virginie Efira, respectively. While Vartolomei is the standout performer here, it is a pity that the film gives Pruvost, Jore and Cottin so little to do, especially as Luchini has way too much screen time as the tiresomely unfunny Beelzebub. The Empire marks Luchini and Dumont's third collaboration together, but there's a sense that this time the director has indulged his star to the point of the film's detriment. As a coda to the Quinquin cycle, The Empire possesses a sloppy charm, and while it's certainly the slightest entry in the trilogy, there is nevertheless some fun to be had from its splicing of the fantastic with the workaday.
With films such as Danton's Death,On Calland We, Alice Diop has carved out a formidable reputation as a documentary filmmaker, and with Saint Omer she takes her first step into narrative cinema. Yet to call Saint Omer a work of fiction is something of a stretch, as the film reconstructs the trial of Fabienne Kabou, who in November 2013 left her baby daughter to drown on a beach in northern France. Intrigued by the case, and with an eye on making a film about the proceedings, Diop herself attended Kabou's 2016 trial, with the experience leading to a feature that is a very different work from the essay film one might have expected from the director. Alice Diop's presence at the actual court sessions further blurs the boundary between verity and fabrication, and as a result Saint Omer occupies an unusual space, one that's somewhere between Diop's previous work and a more orthodox ripped-from-the-headlines drama.
Saint Omer opens with novelist Rama (Kayije Kagame) presenting a lecture on Marguerite Duras, in which an excerpt of Alain Resnais' Duras-scripted Hiroshima Mon Amour is used to help illustrate the point being made; Hiroshima was the feature debut of Resnais, who—like Diop—moved into fiction film after many years of directing documentaries. Explicitly referencing Resnais' immense work is a bold stroke by Diop, one that could easily backfire if the audience's attention is distracted by the clip of a film widely regarded as a classic of 20th-century cinema (even if it is slightly inferior to its immediate successors Last Year at Marienbad and Muriel). But to its credit, Saint Omer survives this risky move and proceeds to follow Rama as she travels to the town of the title to observe the infanticide trial; the writer—who has already identified strong parallels between the case and Euripides' play Medea—plans to use what she witnesses in the court as the basis for a novel. Rama is clearly a stand-in for Diop, and for the purposes of the film the accused, played by Guslagie Malanga, goes by the name of Laurence Coly.
The extremely intelligent, well-educated Coly does not deny leaving her 15-month-old baby to the mercy of a rising tide in wintry Berck-sur-Mer, but she stops short of accepting full responsibility for the crime, instead insisting that witchcraft was the driving force behind the murder. As the judge (Valérie Dréville, terrific) examines the defendant, Coly responds in a calm, measured tone, but there's something about the delivery of her answers that makes her seem less than credible; are those in the court—and by extension the audience—really expected to believe that this highly articulate academic is convinced that she was placed under a curse? As the trial progresses, Rama becomes acquainted with Coly's mother Odile (Salimata Kamate), a patient, kind woman, albeit one who appears resigned as far as her daughter's fate is concerned. In one almost surreal scene, Odile, in a display akin to that of a proud parent, visits a newsagents to purchase a copy of each paper covering the trial
While Rama may have made the connection between Coly and Medea, the young novelist is clearly rattled by some similarities between herself and the woman in the dock: both are black women made pregnant by white men—although Rama's caring, devoted partner Adrien (Thomas de Pourquery) stands in stark contrast to Coly's weaselly ex-lover Luc Dumontet (Xavier Maly), whose testimony appears designed to achieve little beyond extricating the baby's father from this tragic case. All of this is presented in a manner that recalls another film centring on a real-life trial in northern France: Bruno Dumont's Joan of Arc. As with Dumont's film, Saint Omer features a series of long, static takes that will test the patience of many a viewer, but once you tune into the film's highly unusual rhythm it becomes a haunting, hypnotic spectacle. It takes a good while for the full effect of Saint Omer to sink in, and I suspect that this daring, exacting film will reward multiple viewings.
Some months ahead of the autumn 2019 theatrical release of Bruno Dumont's Joan of Arc, the director declared that his next project, On a Half Clear Morning, would star Léa Seydoux and Benoît Magimel. Obviously, much has happened in the world since that announcement was made, and while Seydoux remains at the heart of Dumont's latest, both the film's original title and male lead were jettisoned along the way; the movie now carries the somewhat inferior title of France, while Magimel has been replaced by Benjamin Biolay. In case you've somehow managed to avoid the news, Seydoux has seen another of her films fall victim to pandemic-induced delays; by this time next week, we should know whether the 25th entry in the James Bond series has been worth the wait—or if it's much like the previous 24. With her casting in France, Seydoux joins the handful of big-name stars who have topped the bill in a Bruno Dumont film; while Dumont's previous ten feature films (and two miniseries) have largely featured non-professional performers drawn from his native Flanders, he has diverged from this tradition on a few select occasions—most notably in his work with Juliette Binoche and Fabrice Luchini, both of whom have two appearances for Dumont in their sparkling filmographies.
As France begins, Seydoux's eponymous news anchor is attending a press conference given by French president Emmanuel Macron, while her producer Lou (Blanche Gardin) cheerfully mugs away in the hope that these antics will tickle France (spoiler: they do). This opening quickly establishes France's lofty status: she's a very big deal in the world of journalism, and even Macron knows her name. There are some awful chroma key effects here, and it is doubtful that many will be convinced that Seydoux and Gardin are in the same room as Macron. As it transpires, this isn't the last example of terrible greenscreen to feature in France, and the penny soon drops that known perfectionist Dumont is deliberately employing sub-par process shots, presumably in order to illustrate how so much that is fake is assumed to be real. For France is about how news is presented, and we witness the title character's efforts to stage situations so that they make for the best TV—irrespective of whether she's reporting on migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean or the plight of Tuareg rebels. As someone who manipulates stories that are subsequently broadcast as straight reportage, France is clearly not viewed with any sympathy by Dumont, and this same disdain extends to those who eagerly lap up crass journalism. Here, such consumers are symbolised by the gaggle of adoring fans who continually tail France in the hope of a selfie or an autograph; while France usually obliges with such requests, she's quick to mock her followers once they're out of earshot.
Although much of the film focuses on France's professional life, we do get to see both her opulent apartment and her family: husband Fred (Biolay) is a novelist, and although he's someone who has enjoyed some success in the creative arts, he's much less famous than his wife. Fred and France have a young son, Joseph (Gaëtan Amiel), and it is while on the school run one morning that a distracted France is involved in a minor collision with Baptiste (Jawad Zemmar), a young man on a moped. France makes a real effort to befriend and compensate Baptiste and his family, and something seems to have shifted in the presenter's demeanour; she decides to take some time out from her glittering career, and checks into an exclusive Alpine retreat. There, France meets fellow guest Charles (Emanuele Arioli), and it is an indiscretion with this seemingly charming young man that will prove to be very costly for her. Having engineered countless news reports of her own, France now finds herself at the centre of a contrived scandal, and the outlook is bleak; live by the sword, die by the sword, etc. Yet even worse is to come for France, and a queasy, showstopping scene slyly illustrates the ghoulish sensationalism so prevalent in bottom-rung news reporting.
While it may not be particularly accurate to describe France's title character as a straw target, there's a seeming obviousness to the film that will initially wrongfoot viewers accustomed to Dumont's work; it all feels a bit on the nose. Yet as the film progresses, it becomes apparent that there's something else at work behind the superficial, garden-variety swipe at the media; France is used to both playing to the camera and crying on demand, but as the post-accident version of her becomes more prone to moments of introspection, her tears appear to be genuine. Not for the first time in a Dumont film, the director films his star in striking close-up as they look skyward; while this moment explicitly recalls Joan of Arc, it also has much in common with the closing scene of Dumont's very first feature film, The Life of Jesus, in which the main character stared at the heavens with a newfound awareness. Given all that's preceded this shot, it seems almost unthinkable that France might entertain the notion that there's something more important than herself, yet, although this isn't what could be described as a Damascene conversion, it appears that something inside France has changed for good.
Seydoux, clearly aware that she's playing a caricature for much of France's lengthy running time, is good value in her role, and her presence no doubt contributed to the wide distribution the film enjoyed on its domestic release in late August. Biolay isn't given a great deal to do—although he is involved in one huge scene—and largely appears to be channelling his part in On a Magical Night. As France progresses, it becomes increasingly Dumontian, and Jawad Zemmar gives the sort of performance so typical of non-professionals in the director's films—as does Fabian Fenet, who was so good in his substantial role in Joan of Arc. Fenet has a smaller part this time around, yet he features in a pivotal scene, and his presence—alongside Léa Seydoux and Blanche Gardin, no less—provides a welcome reminder of how adept Dumont is when it comes to getting a tune out of these untutored actors. With much of France set against the backdrop of the big city, there's a welcome change of scenery in the final reel as Dumont moves the action to the Opal Coast he knows so well, and it is here that we experience the film's most moving scene. For this brief stretch, Dumont is both literally and figuratively on home ground, and as France takes in the windswept landscape, she states simply: "It's beautiful here". Indeed.
Following the second series of Li'l Quinquin, Bruno Dumont immediately set about making another sequel with Jeanne, or Joan of Arc, which continues his retelling of the Maid of Orléans' story which began with 2017's demented musical Jeannette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc (which, incidentally, was the very first film to be reviewed in this incarnation of Holland Focus). As with its predecessor, Jeanne is an adaptation of Charles Péguy's 1897 play Jeanne d'Arc, but this time around Dumont mixes it up a bit and opts for much gentler musical accompaniment in the form of the variété française of 70s pop star Christophe (who cameos here), whose distinctive falsetto replaces the much harsher sounds of Jeannette composer Igorrr. There's another key personnel change in the form of cinematographer David Chambille, who comes in for Dumont's longtime DP Guillaume Deffontaines. Chambille, who lensed last year's smash hit Invisibles, steps into Deffontaines' shoes without missing a beat, and his work here on the interiors (of which there were none in Jeannette) proves to be particularly impressive.
But perhaps the biggest surprise in Jeanne - which earned a Special Mention from the jury at Cannes - comes in the form of the casting of its leading actress. While you may have been expecting to see Jeanne Voisin continue in the role she played in the second half of the earlier film, it's Lise Leplat Prudhomme - the younger Joan in the previous instalment - who returns from Jeannette to play a much older version of the character in Jeanne. Apparently Voisin was lined up to play the part but eventually bowed out, leaving Dumont to turn to his other Joan from Jeannette. As a result, watching the two works as a double bill (or simply one very long film) will no doubt be rather jarring in terms of continuity - Joan will apparently get older then younger, perhaps leading viewers to think that Jeanne Voisin's scenes are some sort of flash-forward. But any such issues shouldn't detract from the work of Prudhomme, who gives another terrific performance here, despite playing a character who, by the end of the film, is nearly twice the actress' age. Jeanne is a long, hefty and frequently taxing film, and this talented ten-year-old carries it quite brilliantly.
Jeanne begins with things going very well for the title character as the Hundred Years' War between France and England rages on; with her famous victory at the Battle of Orléans in the bag, Joan is delighted to see the Dauphin crowned king of France. However, after Charles VII (Fabrice Luchini) is installed as monarch (thanks in no small part to Joan's help), he takes a position very different to that of Joan regarding how events should proceed: Charles favours diplomacy, while La Pucelle wishes to continue fighting. As Joan's military luck eventually runs out, she's captured then delivered to the English, for whom she's proved to be quite the fly in the ointment. The rest - indeed, the bulk - of the film is dedicated to the exhaustive, and exhausting, ecclesiastical interrogation which this young woman is subjected to in Rouen (actually Amiens) Cathedral. Needless to say, King Charles is nowhere to be seen as Joan is tried and sentenced. Unless you've been living under a rock, you'll be painfully aware of the horrible, fiery fate which awaits the protagonist, and in Jeanne - as in every other screen version of this story - her inevitable untimely death hangs over the entire duration as events stick to their terrible course.
Movies about Joan of Arc are nearly as old as cinema itself and, of the many films of Joan's story, the one Dumont's take has most in common with is Jacques Rivette's Joan the Maid - although the parallels are only fully obvious now Dumont has made this second film. Rivette's version likewise cast an actress whose age (27) was some way off that of the real Joan, and was also released as two separate films (carrying the sub-titles The Battles and The Prisons), each of which documented a different stage of Joan's short life. Equally perversely, both projects disregard significant events: Jeanne neglects to show the capture of Joan by the Burgundians, while Joan the Maid - which totals a running time of well over five hours in its unexpurgated version - omits her entire trial, slapping up a solitary title card to account for months of what Jeanne depicts. And Dumont, just like Rivette before him and no doubt for similar (i.e. budgetary) reasons, populates his Joan of Arc films with just a few characters at any given time; those coming to any of these films expecting to see hundreds of extras battling it out, Lord of the Rings-style, at Orlèans or Compiègne will be sorely disappointed, and may be better served by Luc Besson's unfairly maligned The Messenger.
While such a constraint could easily have seen all four of the Rivette/Dumont films succumb to an unwelcome staginess (not that Rivette was averse to a bit of theatricality in many of his other films), in Dumont's case this has been resolved via some huge, wide shots of both the windswept Opal Coast and the interior of Amiens Cathedral; both directors' films on Joan - which share a distributor in Les Films du Losange - certainly feel grand (Rivette also used the landscape to let his film open up and breathe). In Jeanne it's actually the cathedral scenes which are the more effective, as the exteriors feature a number of abandoned WW2 blockhouses - one of which serves as Joan's prison - which are far too recognisably 20th century to really aid suspension of disbelief. While these buildings make for an atmospheric backdrop to some of the scenes in the quite contemporary Li'l Quinquin, their presence in Jeanne is most distracting - even if Dumont claims to be aiming for a "timeless" accuracy, as opposed to a historical one. Of course, if you're not familiar with the area where Jeanne was filmed, then this may not present too much of a problem.
In many ways, the main purpose of Jeanne appears to be to replicate the gruelling nature of Joan's trial - that is to say, to make the audience feel as drained, weary and bewildered as our young heroine as she endures endless rounds of arcane questions from the parade of clerics that lines the cathedral's benches. The clergy's attempts may be futile vis-à-vis wearing down the accused, but they prove to be quite effective when it comes to getting the viewer to crack: the screening I attended saw numerous walkouts - apparently a not uncommon occurrence during Jeanne's theatrical release (and festival showings). It's certainly an endurance test, and if the dry theological debates don't get you, chances are the long static takes will. In employing such a daring, unusual film grammar, Dumont has created what is by far his most challenging work; not only is the pacing very slow and deliberate, but at 138 minutes this is the second longest of the director's films (1999's Humanity - which positively flies by in comparison - exceeds it by around ten minutes). Jeannette may have been niche, but its sequel will appeal to far, far fewer. Which is not to say that the film isn't worthwhile; here, Bruno Dumont presents a real cinema experience in which those with sufficient patience (say, of a saint?) will be rewarded - although the austere Jeanne has no intention of giving up its mysteries without a fight. You have been warned.
Bruno Dumont's 1997 debut feature The Life of Jesus has recently been treated to a 4K digital makeover, with this restoration enjoying a release both in cinemas and on home video. Sometimes too much is made of restored versions of films, and most of us have at some stage been burned by this marketing tool, with many a much-trumpeted release failing to produce a noticeable difference between prints old and new. However, in The Life of Jesus' case there is a huge gap in quality between this release and those which preceded it; over the years, the film hasn't always looked in the best of shape, but this pristine new version really does look like it was shot yesterday. There's an added poignancy to this re-release in that the film's star, the charismatic David Douche, died in a house fire four years ago today. The Life of Jesus was Douche's sole acting credit, which is a not uncommon statistic among the non-professionals who populate much of Dumont's work. On hearing of Douche's death, some who knew him were surprised to learn of his big-screen adventure; he apparently never spoke of his starring role in a film which had wowed audiences at Cannes.
If you've never seen the film, it's worth mentioning now that The Life of Jesus isn't actually about the life of Jesus. It's an oblique title (which does become slightly clearer after multiple viewings), one shared with a book by Breton writer Ernest Renan. In Renan's 1863 bestseller, Jesus was portrayed as a great leader, yet one who was categorically human - thus, acts such as his miracles were rejected outright; Renan didn't do this out of disrespect, but rather felt that his take on Jesus would improve Christ's standing as an important historical character, albeit one who should be subjected to the same biographical scrutiny as any other notable person from the past. Naturally, this approach ruffled a few feathers, but Renan sincerely felt that, in humanising Christ and stripping away the supernatural aspects of the gospel, he was affording greater dignity to Jesus and his achievements. While Dumont's film is not an adaptation of the book, the use of Renan's title does feel strangely apt: just as Christ's feats - as according to Renan - required no superhuman powers, acts of evil in the film aren't rooted in the diabolical. In Dumont's films, the spectrum of good and evil is usually somewhat narrower than is generally accepted, yet there's often a yearning for spirituality, too; since The Life of Jesus, Dumont has explored these themes on more than one occasion, most prominently in Outside Satan.
Now you know what the film isn't about, here's the gist: Freddy (Douche) and his friends while away their days in a small provincial Flanders town, with their go-to activity being to race their mopeds through the streets and around the surrounding countryside. None of these aimless young men appears to be gainfully employed; beyond motorbikes, the only shared pastime of note they have is playing in the local marching band. That said, the epileptic Freddy owns a pet finch which he takes great care of, and he does have a girlfriend in Marie (Marjorie Cottreel), who works as a cashier in the local supermarket. Marie and Freddy's relationship is tested by the latter's erratic behaviour, and once Kader (Kader Chaatouf) - a young man of North African heritage who's been subjected to the casual racism of Freddy et al. - enters the fray and begins to vie for Marie's affections, you just know that this isn't going to end well. On account of his epilepsy, Freddy is no stranger to hospitals, but it's actually when he's attending one as a visitor that we get the film's sole explicit biblical reference: as the brother of one of Freddy's friends lies dying of AIDS, we see a picture on the wall of the raising of Lazarus. But, in line with Ernest Renan's theories regarding Jesus' abilities, there will be no resurrection for this unfortunate patient.
Even after a dozen films - and we'll be reviewing his latest next month - The Life of Jesus still stands as Dumont's most accessible work, with only Hadewijchand Flanders mounting a serious challenge to that title. While it occasionally flirts with the transgressiveness which would turn full-bore with Dumont's next two films - Humanity and Twentynine Palms - The Life of Jesus plays as a direct and engrossing work, one which at no point feels like a first film; the fluency displayed in much later works such as Camille Claudel 1915 is fully evident here. In his films, Dumont has seldom strayed from his own back yard, using the backdrop of the Flanders he knows to great effect. It has often been said that he frequently uses the landscape as a character in its own right, and nowhere is this more apparent than in The Life of Jesus, in which we see Dumont's home town and its environs in different seasons. But, regardless of whether it's a stifling summer or a snowy winter, Freddy's life never changes very much - until the final reel. Late on in the film, we glimpse an ant running along Freddy's bare arm, while he in turn looks to the sky - seemingly newly aware that he, just like the insect, is part of something much bigger.
Police captain Van der Weyden is one of the more memorable characters in recent television history (OK, I must admit I don't watch much TV), and since this character - played by the untutored Bernard Pruvost - first appeared in Bruno Dumont's Li'l Quinquin, I've been itching to see more of him; that show, which ran to four episodes (and also played in cinemas as one long film), was always ripe for another series. A sequel is now finally here in the form of Coincoin and the Extra-Humans and, happily, second time around proves no obstacle for the director and his fine cast of non-pros who, four years on, effortlessly slip back into this surreal and occasionally very troubling world. Bruno Dumont has been no slouch between these two series, pumping out both Slack Bay and Jeannette, the latter of which, like Quinquin, enjoyed near-simultaneous big and small screen releases.
As with Li'l Quinquin, this latest endeavour consists of four episodes of around 50 minutes each. Pretty much everyone from the first show is back for this caper - even Lisa Hartmann's Aurélie, and if you saw the first series and are wondering how this can be possible, just watch and you'll see - oh, you'll see. Whereas Van der Weyden's bizarre investigation last time around was at least rooted in reality with its hunt for a murderer (who, predictably enough, was never revealed nor apprehended), this series jumps off the deep end from the start as a strange black magma is splatting down from the skies. This substance proves mystifying enough to both police and civilians, but its true menace is only revealed each dusk as it releases a floating light which proceeds to invade an unfortunate, seemingly random local resident, who then spawns a doppelgänger; rinse and repeat.
In addition to the antics of Van der Weyden and his sidekick Carpentier (Philippe Jore) - who spends much of his time stunt driving their Citroën C4 police car - there is of course plenty of screen time for the title character, played by Alane Delhaye. As you may have noticed, he now goes by the name Coincoin - presumably as he's no longer a quinquin, or small child. While many of the returning cast members look pretty much the same as they did before, the biggest change, predictably, comes in the appearances of the child actors, who in the space of four years have gone from kids just out of primary school to teens on the cusp of adulthood. In these intervening years, Coincoin has separated from Eve (Lucy Caron) and over the course of the new series gets romantically involved with the flighty Jenny (Alexia Depret), daughter of the regional leader of sinister political party the Bloc. Like Coincoin, Eve has also moved on to another partner, but it's clear that these childhood sweethearts still harbour some feelings for one another.
Although Coincoin and the Extra-Humans has one foot planted in slapstick, it does take the time to touch upon some serious concerns, such as the European migrant crisis and the rise of the far right - the Bloc clearly a proxy for Marine Le Pen's Rassemblement national, much like the fictional RNP were in last year's Chez nous(when Le Pen's party were still known as the Front national). A disconcerting development occurs when some of the Bloc's foot soldiers talk about travelling to Calais for a "bonfire"; thankfully, this appears to be little more than bravado, although the group's walk through a tunnel which plays home to some migrants makes for a tense couple of minutes. But these darker aspects are largely kept in the background, never getting in the way of an investigation which, if you know this director, is never likely to lead to much of consequence. Rather, Dumont is fixed on his characters and their interactions, and the forensics of police work - just as in Slack Bay, Humanity or indeed Li'l Quinquin - prove to be of no real interest to the director. As is usual for Dumont, the landscape of his own back yard here proves to be a character in its own right, and DP Guillaume Deffontaines - in his fifth collaboration with the director - serves up some wonderfully evocative widescreen cinematography.
While the vast majority of the actors seen here were in the first series, there are a couple of additions to the cast which will arouse interest among Dumont scholars: Nicolas Leclaire, whose performance in Jeannette was a comic highlight, turns up here as Jenny's uncle, but the real shock comes in the form of an appearance by Humanity's Emmanuel Schotté who plays, er, another of Jenny's uncles (or should that be "uncles"?) Schotté's only screen role prior to Coincoin was in Humanity, for which he won the best actor prize at Cannes; you can't help but feel that he went into exile on account of the backlash afforded to the controversial Humanity, on which Cannes' David Cronenberg-led jury bestowed two other prestigious awards. There's something quite touching about his reappearance here after nearly 20 years away from acting, and it seems only fitting that his second (final?) role is in something directed by Dumont.
Needless to say, Coincoin and the Extra-Humans comes highly recommended, and it's amazing how it follows Li'l Quinquin so seamlessly. It's hard to pick which of the two series is better, but that all eight episodes could play as a single, fluid work is testament to the remarkable consistency on display here. While the cast will all, presumably, go back to doing whatever it is they normally do (Pruvost is a gardener at a centre for disabled people), a third adventure with these characters would be extremely welcome, so let's hope it eventually materialises. With much of the dialogue presented in undiluted ch'timi, Dumont proves to be as intransigent as ever; that said, who would have thought that the director and star of the bleak, severe and austere Humanity would one day reunite for a knockabout TV comedy?
Look Closely at the Mountains is an engaging slice of experimenta which features two areas inextricably linked with mining: Minas Gerais in Brazil, and France's Nord-Pas-de-Calais (actually now part of Hauts-de-France, a concept which I still can't get used to). Apart from the obvious cultural differences between the two, each place's attitude to mining could hardly be more different. The Nord-Pas-de-Calais, after three centuries of the type of heavy industry made famous by Zola, finally abandoned mining in the 1980s; the region subsequently looked to erase the activity from its collective memory, before eventually acknowledging it as an important part of its heritage. Minas, on the other hand, is an area in which mining is still very much alive - despite the state being the location of the Bento Rodrigues dam catastrophe of 2015, which is widely considered to be the worst environmental disaster in Brazil's history.
The juxtaposition is extreme, to say the very least. In Minas, we witness the mining-assisted erosion of history and culture, whereas the industry's legacy in the Nord-Pas-de-Calais includes genuinely surprising biodiversity; there's quite an array of flora and fauna among the many slag heaps which pepper the rich coal seam that runs just next to the Belgian border. We barely get a glimpse of the ex-mining sites of France in daylight, but rather are treated to nocturnal footage of the resident wildlife being studied and measured by diligent workers. Oh, and there are some seriously cute bats featured here - you have been warned.
There is much to admire here - the basic concept is quite brilliant in its simplicity - but there is one rather off-putting aspect to the film in the form of its overall look. At any given time, the photography is either washed out or excessively murky; while this is no doubt a stylistic choice, the visual ugliness may well prove a barrier to some viewers. Which is a pity because, in its own idiosyncratic way, the film really does have something important to say. As experimenta goes, Look Closely at the Mountains is one of the more accessible examples, and makes for a good starting point for those yet to become acquainted with such fare. It screens alongside The Sun Quartet and Optimism at the London Film Festival on the 14th of October.
Screening at the London Film Festival on the 10th and 11th of October, Belgian actor-director Lucas Belvaux's film shares a number of features with Dany Boon's Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis: the Nord-Pas-de-Calais milieu; actress Anne Marivin; crowd scenes filmed at RC Lens' stade Bollaert-Delelis; oh, and the word chez in its title. It does significantly deviate from Boon's über-smash in that in no way could Chez nous (English title: This is Our Land) be described as a feel-good movie; it is, however, an absorbing and well-crafted film that has enough momentum to get past some heavy-handed moments.
Single mother Pauline (Émilie Dequenne) is a nurse who, while making a home visit, discovers the elderly patient has died. Pauline waits for the ambulance and a Dr. Berthier (André Dussolier) to arrive for the formalities. Berthier knows Pauline quite well as he treated her late mother and now does the same for her ailing father. The pleasant if reserved doctor invites Pauline round to his house for dinner, where he promptly springs it on her that she's his ideal choice to run for mayor of their town. Pauline is flattered but declines, although some difficult patients in her already tough job make the offer seem even more attractive, and, greatly encouraged by her friend Nathalie (Marivin), she eventually agrees to stand.
The party she's representing - the fictional RNP - are headed by Agnès Dorgelle (Catherine Jacob), a steely politician who has apparently softened the image of the far right by breaking with her father's party and its more in-your-face brand of politics; working from a nominally reformed manifesto, Dorgelle Jr.'s EU-bashing, jingoistic, anti-immigration stance is recognised by most for what it is: a slicker, covert repackaging of the same militant views. Getting attractive, clever, affable everywomen such as Pauline to act as poster girls is exactly what the RNP need if they are to make serious inroads into mainstream politics.
Standing for an extreme party unsurprisingly brings its tough moments, and Pauline's life grows even busier when she reconnects with Stanko, her boyfriend from high school. Stanko is caring and kind to Pauline and her children, yet there's another, sinister side to his life, which is tied in with a murky past involving Berthier. With the election looming, Berthier tells Stanko to keep away from Pauline, as he feels that Stanko's illegal activities - should they be exposed by the press - would sink Pauline's chances of winning.
Chez nous attracted some controversy when it was released in France earlier this year, given how closely Jacob's character resembles Marine Le Pen. Arriving in cinemas before the presidential elections took place, Le Pen's supporters fumed at the perceived attack on their leader. While France - unlike the UK and the US in recent times - ultimately rejected voting for an extreme, Le Pen nonetheless went the distance, losing only in the final round to Emmanuel Macron. While Macron's victory was decisive, Le Pen's Front national had moved from fringe dwellers to a party that won a full third of the vote, and this fuelled the new populist right fire that Brexit and Trump had ignited. The unsettling thing about Chez nous is that it shows a pleasant, reasonable woman being seduced by a party she doesn't really share an ideology with; Pauline is no extremist crackpot, and Belvaux's film shows how a well-adjusted person - one who's only slightly disillusioned - can be lured into darker waters. The film does deal with some thorny issues, and no doubt Belvaux and Dequenne felt relieved that their Belgian passports put some distance between them and the subject.
Dequenne tends to light up any film she appears in, and here she's as appealing as ever, yet she's an actress who never quite seems to get the full recognition she truly deserves. Sure, she's won a couple of times at Cannes, but she's a really remarkable performer who seems destined to remain underrated as lesser Francophone actresses hog the upper echelon. The veteran Dussolier, like Dequenne, is a very likeable, completely dependable presence, and his part here again proves that he can do creepy when required; further evidence of him in this mode can be had in 21 Nights with Pattie and Resnais' Wild Grass. Guillaume Gouix, best known from his role in TV series The Returned, provides good support as Stanko, who's a far more complicated character than he first appears.
There are moments where Belvaux could have dialled it down a bit - in one scene, a TV documentary can be heard in which the narrator talks about a non-native crab that's taking over the English channel, and Jacob's Le Pen avatar is just a bit too broad to be properly successful. Naming the town Hénard is also rather clunky (it's a contraction of the old name for Hénin-Beaumont, a town in Le Pen's constituency which has an FN mayor). At the other end of the spectrum, there's a sublime moment when Berthier corrects a party colleague who's described Stanko as a neo-Nazi - nationalist revolutionary is the term to use, apparently; the brilliant, telling riposte is that not everyone's studied political science. With its atmospheric northern French locations - which the director failed to fully exploit in his disappointing One Night - Chez nous stands as Belvaux's best film for quite some time, and it works very nicely as a solid drama with a political slant. The DVD/Blu-ray is available in France.
Jeannette, l'enfance de Jeanne d'Arc (English: Jeannette: The Childhood of Joan of Arc), which screened at this year's Cannes, has had a rather atypical release in that it debuted on French television one week before appearing in cinemas. Word has it that the TV and cinema versions do differ a little, but the fact that most could watch the film for free has obviously impacted on the domestic theatrical release: it would appear that a lone print is touring Paris' MK2 cinemas during the first week, while screenings in cities including Lille, Dunkerque and Amiens - all firmly within director Bruno Dumont's native Nord-Pas-de-Calais - are also taking place.
Set during the Hundred Years' War, Jeannette's story is adequately described by its full title, as we witness Joan of Arc first as a young girl, then a teenager, before finally heading off to battle - basically, it ends at the point where virtually all other films about the Maid of Orleans begin. Plot-wise, there isn't much else to say, and the bulk of the film sees Joan among her sheep in the sand dunes (of Wissant, where Dumont's Ma Loute was also shot) as she gradually gets to grips with her calling. What the title doesn't tell you is that this is a musical, although one that most definitely doesn't carry the broad appeal of La La Land. The film is based on two works by Charles Péguy, and his turn of the century writing comes to life as lyrics set to the music of electronicore artist Igorrr. Refreshingly, the vocals were recorded live on set, as opposed to the usual process of lip-syncing to playback. This makes the two lead performances all the more remarkable, plus it lends the type of authentic immediacy we've long since associated with this director.
The title character is played by two actresses, who, looks-wise, are a good fit for each other. Lise Leplat Prudhomme takes on the role of the 8-year-old Joan, and the teenaged version is essayed by Jeanne Voisin; the younger Joan is known as the Jeannette of the title, whereas the diminutive suffix is dropped by the time the future saint hits double figures. Each actress gets an equal share of screen time, with the film pretty much split down the middle as it depicts these two stages of Joan's life. While it's easy to simply think that Dumont's film is about the young Joan of Arc, it's rather poignant to consider that she was actually never anything other than young, given that she perished at the stake just a few short years after the events shown in this film. Most biopics focusing on a subject's youth tend to show someone who went on to have a reasonably full life, or at least made it beyond their teens, whereas the childhood depicted here comprised the bulk of Joan's existence.
Jeannette is yet another good example of Dumont turning up unknowns who give truly captivating performances. His major find here is highlighted within the film's first few minutes as Prudhomme, in a bravura sequence, sings and dances her way through an extended number among the dunes. It's an engrossing, amusing and oddly moving opening, and the young actress greatly impresses in the time (nearly an hour) in which she's on screen. By the time it gets to Voisin's chance to shine, the novelty factor is slightly diminished - the older actress is, somewhat unsurprisingly, a slicker performer, and the raw appeal of her predecessor is notably absent. But Voisin is very watchable, too - scenes with her and a rapping Ch'ti uncle (Nicolas Leclaire, the most typically Dumontian member of the cast) make for the film's comic highlights - and we should remember it's not her fault she's on second.
Watching the performers here is a reminder that Dumont works better in full-on Bresson mode, i.e. when he casts non-professionals - while Camille Claudel 1915 and, to a lesser extent, Ma Loute both showed that he can operate perfectly well when accommodating big stars, it's the unfiltered, direct essence that Dumont is able to draw from largely untutored performers that gives his work a unique edge. DP Guillaume Deffontaines, in his fourth collaboration with Dumont, expertly captures the windswept vistas of this part of the Pas-de-Calais, and his camerawork is always inventive (although never intrusive), which is especially important given that most of the film takes place in a single location.
Dumont's films are not for all tastes, so if you're familiar with his previous work chances are you'll know if this film is for you. Anyone who's studied his career will note how, post-Camille Claudel 1915, he's taken something of a left turn and planted one foot (perhaps just one toe?) in comedy: P'tit Quinquin - series 2 of which is due next year - was a semi-humorous retread of his earlier L'humanité, while Ma Loute took the same basic template and cranked up the broad comic elements. Jeannette manages to be humorous (can any film featuring headbanging nuns really be anything else?) yet sincere, and at no point does Dumont appear to be mocking his subject or her beliefs. The film's closing shot is really quite affecting when you consider the fate that soon awaits the unknowing Joan. Go from this to Jacques Rivette's Jeanne la Pucelle and you'll have quite a double (or should that be triple?) bill.
