Téchiné’s In the Name of My Daughter

What was a classy lady like Renée Le Roux doing running a casino in Nice? Unfortunately, she did not have much time at the helm of the Palais de la Méditerranée before getting forced out by the Mafia. Pardon, make that: eased out by a rival casino operator with reputed underworld ties. It would be a bitter defeat for Madame Le Roux, costing her far more than control over the casino. André Téchiné adapts her memoir of the so-called “Nice Casino War,” but he de-emphasizes the Scorsese-esque elements throughout In the Names of My Daughter (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

The Palais was once tightly held by the Le Roux family, but when Madame Le Roux assumed the directorship of the casino, they barely retained a fifty-one percent stake. Many of the minor shareholders were opposed to her appointment, requiring her slightly estranged daughter Agnès to duly vote in favor of her mum. It was a victory orchestrated by her legal advisor Maurice Agnelet, who made something of an impression on the recently divorced Agnès. He happens to be married, but that does not mean much to either of them. Frankly, he is not nearly as attracted to her as she is to him. However, when Madame Le Roux refuses to appoint him as her general manager, he starts manipulating her daughter (and her shares) to extract revenge.

The daughter will indeed betray the mother, but from that point on, the chain of events gets mysteriously murky and tragic. Agnelet will ultimately face trial three times, yet Téchiné prefers to handle such dramatic red meat in the film’s postscript. Arguably, the intrigue and duplicity of the Casino War could have challenged the gangsterism of Cédric Jimenez’s The Connection, but Téchiné prefers to zero-in on the emotionally fraught mother-daughter relationship. The screenplay co-written by Jean-Charles Le Roux, who excised himself and his brothers from the picture, focuses on his anguished mother rather than the defiant Angelet.

Nobody can lord over an elegant old-money casino like Catherine Deneuve. If you had shares in the Palais, you would vote with her too. Despite some unnecessary passage-of-time makeup, she rock-solidly anchors the film as Madame Le Roux. She instantly suggests a sense of Le Roux’s comfort in this exclusive world, as well as the long and thorny history she shares with both her daughter and former advisor. Guillaume Canet’s Agnelet is not exactly flashy, but he is convincingly cold-blooded, thin-skinned, and borderline sociopathic. On the other hand, Adèle Haenel’s turn as Agnès, the needy hipster, often rings hollow, sounds flat, or some such metaphor, but as you might surmise from the title, she will not be around for the closing credits.

The seductive and captivating thing about Téchiné films like Thieves and Unforgivable is the way they incorporate thriller elements while skirting the boundaries of genre cinema. Yet, it becomes almost perverse in the case of the Casino War and the three resulting murder trials. Nonetheless, Téchiné pulls viewers into the story and through the film with a strong directorial hand that characteristically feels deceptively light. Recommended in spite and because of his auteurist idiosyncrasies, In the Name of My Daughter opens this Friday (5/15) in New York, at the IFC Center and the Lincoln Plaza Cinemas.

Techine’s Unforgivable

Evidently Venice is a lot like New York.  You will find a lot of writers and realtors there.  One fateful day, a French mystery novelist walks into a former fashion model’s real estate agency.  It will be the start of a very complicated relationship for the lead characters in André Téchiné’s latest pseudo-thriller, Unforgivable (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

There seems to be an inverse relationship between Francis’s creative productivity and his domestic happiness.  He came to Venice to write in seclusion, but took up with Judith instead.  At least she had the perfect rental for him: a secluded old villa on the island of Sant’Erasmo.  Happy with his new home and lover, Francis has not written a word in months.  Fortunately or unfortunately, that will all change when his ostensibly grown daughter Alice comes to visit.

Either to get back at Francis or her vastly more responsible ex, Alice disappears without warning, apparently taking up with a penniless aristocratic drug dealer.  Not inclined to let things be, Francis hires the half-retired private detective Anna Maria, a woman from Judith’s past, to shadow his daughter across the continent.  As Francis’s escalating emotional neediness turns to jealousy, he hires Anna Maria’s delinquent son to shadow Judith in turn.

Based on Philippe Djian’s novel, Unforgivable is a perfect example of Téchiné’s knack for skirting the boundaries of the thriller genre without fully crossing over.  He toys with plenty of noir conventions, such as a mysterious disappearance, a smarmy underworld figure, and a whole lot of skulking about the streets of Venice.  Yet, Téchiné is more concerned with his characters’ extreme emotions—the passion, jealousy, and contempt driving their actions.

Perfectly cast as Francis, André Dussollier projects the appropriate sophistication, arrogance, and insecurity, while still connecting with something fundamentally human and sympathetic about the character.  However, the real pleasure of Unforgivable is seeing Carole Bouquet (the most under-appreciated “Bond Girl” ever in the pinnacle film of the Roger Moore era, For Your Eyes Only) as Judith, the mature femme fatale.  Indeed, it is a smart, delicately calibrated performance.

Capitalizing on the mysterious Venetian backdrop, Unforgivable is like a film noir for those who avoid on-screen violence and cynicism.  It is literate and worldly, yet compassionately forgiving of its characters self-defeating foibles (title notwithstanding).  Highly recommended for French film connoisseurs, it opens this Friday (6/29) in New York at the IFC Center downtown and the Beekman Theatre uptown.

Techine’s Thieves

André Téchiné is one of those uncommon directors who can deftly stage an ambiguous morality play without indulging in pretention or didacticism. A film like 1996’s Thieves (Les Voleurs) has an icy intelligence that probably won’t get him programmed on Oprah’s network anytime soon, but it deserves to reach its audience. Happily, Téchiné’s Thieves is now available to discerning viewers through Columbia Classics’ new Screen Classics by Request collector’s line of previously unavailable films.

Justin’s father Ivan has died. The details are murky. However, we can tell the young boy is not thrilled by the presence of his Uncle Alex. There was indeed some biblical sibling rivalry festering between them. We start to understand their feud better as Téchiné shifts time and POV, showing us how Alex, an honest but joyless cop, met Juliette Fontana, the woman he brought to his brother’s wake. Their first encounter was strictly professional, when Alex, acting out of character, let her walk on a shoplifting charge. The next time he runs into her, it is part of the dodgy scene at Ivan’s dubious nightclub.

Thus begins an affair that is neither loving nor passionate, but base and animalistic. It works for Alex though. The exact nature of her relationship with Ivan remains obscure, but she has another lover who is everything Alex is not. Marie Leblanc is supportive, sophisticated, considerate, and yes, a woman. Strangely enough, Alex and Leblanc will become allies of a sort when Juliette is caught up in Ivan’s funny business.

Of course, nothing is straight forward in Thieves, which Téchiné makes all the more mysterious with his elliptical narrative structure. It is not that the audience cannot guess the general nature of the very real crimes afoot. It is more about who knows what and how they feel about each other.

Daniel Auteuil is perfectly cast as Alex, the iceman who starts to crack, nicely conveying the dangerous resentment below his reserved exterior. Likewise, Catheine Deneuve is completely convincing as the book-smart but unworldly Leblanc. However, it is hard to understand their mutual attraction to Laurence Cote, who seems neither intriguing nor particularly alluring as Fontana.

Thieves is a film for smart adults, unfolding in unexpected ways. Its razor-sharp dialogue, co-written by Téchiné and Gilles Taurand often has a bracing “oh snap” character that gives the film a considerable edge. A very good outing from a major filmmaker, Thieves is an excellent selection for Columbia’s promising new Screen Classics By Request imprint.

Téchiné’s Girl on the Train

With an influx of immigration from Islamist states and an upsurge in Neo-fascist activity, anti-Semitic violence is a growing problem in France. Of course, many would prefer to ignore the problem, which is why hate crime hoaxes like the “RER D Affair” (so-called for the commuter train on which it ostensibly occurred) are so counter-productive. Based on that 2004 incident involving a non-Jewish woman who claimed to have been attacked by an immigrant gang mistaking her for Jewish, veteran French director André Téchiné deftly handles some very hot-button issues in The Girl on the Train (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Much to Louise’s eternal frustration, her daughter Jeanne is not particularly ambitious. It is a major victory just to get her to interview for a secretarial position at Samuel Bleistein’s prestigious boutique law firm. Frankly, she is not qualified for the position and rather underwhelming presenting herself, but when Bleistein realizes she is the daughter of a late army colleague and Louise, the woman for whom he once carried a torch, he at least willing to give her a fair hearing.

Not cut out for responsible living, Jeanne instead takes a questionable job with her boyfriend Franck, an impulsive collegiate wrestler, as caretakers of a dodgy electronics warehouse. Though Franck keeps her in a state of willing obliviousness, the violent reality of their criminal enterprise eventually intrudes on Jeanne’s vacation from reality. Unfortunately, Jeanne responds by compounding her troubles, fabricating an attack supposedly motivated by anti-Semitism that will directly involve Bleistein and his family in a burgeoning media frenzy as well as her own personal drama.

Samuel Bleistein is a character many New Yorkers will find distinctly foreign. Yes, he is the leading Parisian spokesman against anti-Semitic violence, but he is not a media huckster looking to capitalize on each new controversy. He truly believes in the rule of law, which is why he seeks to defuse the situation created by a story he has reasons for knowing to be false.

Téchiné has a reputation as a sensitive director and indeed he guides his excellent ensemble cast to some very fine performances. As frustrating as her character might be, Emilie Dequenne is quite convincing, essentially playing a psychologically underdeveloped personality. However, the film is probably best defined by Michel Blanc’s outstanding supporting turn as Bleistein, providing the film a shrewdly unsentimental but deeply humanistic perspective on the controversies that unfold. Of course, for many fans of French cinema, no one will up-stage Catherine Deneuve, playing a bit against her typically chilly type here as Louise, the justifiably concerned mother.

Even though Train hinges on a fabricated incident, the film never has the effect of minimizing the reality of anti-Semitism in France. Again, it is worth noting that it is the film’s Jewish characters that act to debunk Jeanne’s dubious claim. Train is a smart drama that powerfully captures the aimlessness of youth and the volatility French society through some richly rewarding performances. It opens Friday (1/22) in New York at the IFC Center.