In
France, Marcelo Novais Teles has famous friends. Here in America, they would be
considered prestigious or well-connected. By far, the best known is Mathieu Amalric,
the former Bond villain. They knew each other from way back, but Teles never
really caught like his friends. Nevertheless, he has been on the French scene
for years, as his home movies will attest in The Exiled, which screens during this year’s First Look at the
Museum of the Moving Image.
Teles
first came to France in 1982. He quickly decided to stay to learn French and
pursue an acting career. Of course, there was also that military regime back in
Brazil, but they left power in 1985, yet he still stayed in Paris. In fact, it
seems like very little has changed for him since 1982.
In
the assembled home movies, we see Teles and his circle of friends rehearse, run
lines, host dinner parties, talk about failed love affairs, and just generally
drink. Many of them had success, like Amalric and his wife Jeanne Balibar.
Olivier Broche is best known in France for his television work, but that is
still not bad for a former struggling artist. Isabelle Ungaro has more imdb
credits as a casting director than an actress, but there are probably plenty of
people in the French film industry who will be curious to watch her during her early
professional years.
Unfortunately,
Teles could very well be the least interesting of the bunch. He is also the
saddest. A clear picture emerges of a man alienated from his family and
homeland, who is still scuffling by, despite work that presumably comes his way
through Amalric and Ungaro. Having long suspected he fathered his former
Brazilian lover’s first daughter, he now satisfies his paternal instincts by being
his friends always-available babysitter.
