The Innocents: A Test of Faith and Ideology

Mathilde Beaulieu’s faith will be challenged by the horrors she witnesses as a Red Cross doctor during WWII—her Communist faith. She was supposed to oversee the repatriation of French POW and concentration camp prisoners, but she also reluctantly started treating the nuns of convent repeatedly raped by the conquering Soviet Red Army. To do so, Beaulieau will risk more than her ideology in Anne Fontaine’s The Innocents (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Beaulieu’s mission parameters are rigidly focused on French nationals, so she tries her best to turn away the distraught nun. Her Communist materialism also makes her instinctively antagonistic towards the Catholic Church. However, she ultimately relents, moved by the woman’s desperation and apparent piety. When she arrives at the convent she immediately understands why the sisters refused to seek help from the Russians or fellow Poles.

She finds one nun on the brink of delivery and many others in advanced stages of pregnancy. They were the spoils of war for our Russian allies, who raped them repeatedly during several visits. Fearful the future Soviet-dominated government will use the pregnancies to discredit the Church, the Mother Superior is desperate to keep their condition secret. The nuns’ vows of modesty also make routine examinations difficult. Yet, the nuns slowly start to trust Beaulieu, especially the worldlier Maria, who joined the order after having experienced a bit of secular life.

Based on the records of French Resistance and Red Cross physician Madeleine Pauliac (whose nephew Philippe Maynial developed the film’s original story), Innocents is an uncomfortably true episode of WWII history. Undoubtedly, some churlishly pedantic critics will object to the bestial depiction of the Red Army. Yet, the awkward truth is Stalin had largely purged anyone from the military who exhibited any signs of intelligence or talent by this time. All that were left were the brutish and the blindly loyal, so yes, the film portrays them with rigorous historical accuracy.

It will also be tempting for some to think of Innocents as a prequel to the Oscar-winning Ida, especially since Agata Kulesza and Joanna Kulig appear in both films, albeit in radically different roles. While the latter was the standout as the notorious Communist hanging judge in Pawlikowski’s film, she has a harder time humanizing the rigid Mother Superior, which becomes somewhat problematic.

Regardless, French rising star Lou de Laâge is terrific anchoring the film as Beaulieu. She has a smart, forceful presence much greater than her slender size would suggest. She also forges some intriguing chemistry with the resilient Sister Maria, played with earnest grit by Agata Buzek. (We frequently defend the under-rated Jason Statham film Redemption, so it is worth noting that is where Fontaine first saw the accomplished Polish thesp.)

Fontaine also gets credit for vividly capturing the terrible sinking feeling a woman would get when pulled over by a Soviet patrol. Frankly, The Innocents is not likely to get much distribution in Putin’s Russia, but that attests to its honesty and artistic integrity. In fact, the period details are all carefully realized and the large ensemble cast really knuckles down, seamlessly blending into this bleak, war-scarred environment. Highly recommended, The Innocents opens this Friday (7/1) in New York, at the Lincoln Plaza uptown and the Angelika Film Center downtown.

Gemma Bovery: What’s in a Name?

Gustave Flaubert was an exacting writer who often spent days perfecting a handful of lines, making him a fitting literary idol for a fussbudget like Martin Joubert. As a result, when an English woman named Gemma Bovery (mind the “g” and the “e”) moves to his Rouen village, he quickly fixates on her similarity with Flaubert’s Emma Bovary. Her curviness does not exactly dampen his interest either. Literary obsession will have comedic and tragic implications in Anne Fontaine’s Gemma Bovery (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Joubert was once a miserable editor for a Parisian publishing house, but he has been much happier since he returned to Normandy to take over the family bakery—up until now. It was Charlie Bovery’s idea to move to France. Even though his somewhat younger wife Gemma does not speak French, the antiques restorer thought the charms of provincial life would be a healthier environment for them. However, as Joubert immediately suspects, small town life is rather stifling for the passionate namesake.

As part narrator and part Iago, we watch the story unfold through Joubert’s jealous eyes. He is perfectly positioned for spying, since the Boverys moved in right across the street from the Jouberts. Despite his obvious infatuation, the curt Valérie Joubert is not particularly concerned about anything happening between them, for obvious reasons. However, when Bovery commences an illicit affair with the shiftless son of the wealthy Madame de Bressigny, Joubert’s rash petulance will set in motion an unfortunate but perhaps inevitable series of events.

With her adaptation of Posy Simmonds’ graphic novel (with co-screenwriter Pascal Bonitzer), Fontaine completely redeems herself for the cringing smarminess of Adore. This is a wickedly droll film that saunters towards its sad end with a strangely carefree but knowing vibe. Frankly, the final ten or fifteen minutes are just about brilliant.

Of course, Fabrice Luchini is perfectly at home with Martin Joubert’s literate humor and angst-ridden yearning. He plays a darkly comic figure, but one that is dashed easy to relate to. Frankly, someone like Film Forum or MoMA ought to program an overdue retrospective of his films. Gemma Arterton alos brings an earthy sensuality to the film as Bovery and earns credit for her diligence learning French. Yet, one of the film’s most notable surprises is Jason Flemyng’s dignified, humanistic portrayal of Charlie Bovery, who is quite the far cry from the put-upon cartographer of the recent chaotic Russian maelstrom that is Forbidden Empire.

Although Fontaine’s film certainly has a smart sensibility, it is never too clever for its own good. Its sly literary parallels, allusions, and foreshadowing emerge organically from a wholly satisfying narrative. There is not one scene that feels forced (but there are plenty of times Joubert will have viewers wincing at his recklessness). Very highly recommended for fans of French cinema and French literature, Gemma Bovery opens this Friday (5/29) in New York, at the Lincoln Plaza and Landmark Sunshine theaters.

Adore (or Whatever it’s Titled Today)

English language Nobel laureates for literature have complicated relationship with cinema.  Arguably, Steinbeck has fared the best, providing the source material for masterworks from John Ford and Elia Kazan.  Ernest Hemingway films have been a radically mixed bag, including some gems and some clunkers.  Faulkner films have generally been an iffy proposition.  However, director Anne Fontaine and screenwriter Christopher Hampton will drastically lower the curve with their smarmy adaptation of Doris Lessing’s The Grandmothers, now known as Adore (trailer here) for its New York opening this Friday.

Lessing’s original title, The Grandmothers, obviously does not sound very sexy.  Hence, Fontaine’s film was known as Two Mothers at Sundance, where my colleagues in the press corps took the bullet to inform the world this was no art movie.  Six months or so later, it was re-titled Adore, right up there at the top of the alphabet, presumably to be VOD friendly.  No matter what it’s called, this film is sure to disappoint.

Lil’s husband never was much, so when he dies, she is able to carry-on raising her son Ian well enough on her own, with the help of her BFF Roz.  Roz also has a son, Tom, and a perfectly serviceable husband, Harold, who just does not seem to be the sort of doofus she wants anymore.  For most of the summer, the lads surf, while their mother booze it up on the shore, drinking up their lean frames.  Eventually, Ian puts the moves on Roz and Tom follows suit with Lil.

Oh gee, how scandalous.  At least, that is how the filmmakers would like us to react.  Frankly, it is not worth getting worked up over.  Never before has cougar-boy toy sex been so boring.  In lieu of substance, we get an interminable surfeit of morning after shots, following the characters walking on the beach, staring off into the horizon.  Yet, by far the gravest sin of Adore (Fontaine’s dubious English language debut) is Hampton’s ridiculous dialogue.  There is no way real people would ever talk like this.  However, it probably looked great on the page, eliciting all sorts of “edgy” compliments from Hampton’s screenwriter colleagues.

Indeed, there is a cynical laziness to Adore that assumes it merely needs to deliver the promised quota of taboo sex for critics and viewers to be intimidated by “provocative” nature.  The truth is there is no there there.  The characters are paper thin and not once do their reactions ring true.  Anyone who can tell Xavier Samuel’s Ian apart from James Frecheville’s Tom should win a cigar from exhibiting theaters.  Naomi Watts and Robin Wright have a few nice moments together, but evidently Fontaine and Hampton believe the world already had enough films about friendships between middle aged women.

Yes, Adore addresses sexual relations, but never with any kind of intelligence or maturity.  In truth, it lacks the depth and insight of an average Pia Zadora movie.  Slow, smug, and shallow, Adore is an absolute waste of the talents of Fontaine (whose The Girl from Monaco is far sexier and more emotionally complicated), Watts, Wright, and the normally reliable Ben Mendelsohn.  Not recommended, especially for those who think it might hold guilty pleasures, Adore opens this Friday (9/6) in New York at the Angelika Film Center.