Cannes: "Un Conte de Noel," "Three Monkeys"

Un Conte de Noel (Competition)

"Now that is a movie!" I exclaimed to a friend on exiting this morning's screening of Arnaud Desplechin's Un Conte De Noel (A Christmas Story). The bourgeois-dysfunctional-family-comes-together-for-a-holiday setup is one of the hoariest in any medium, but if anybody can conjure something fresh out of it, it's Desplechin, and boy does he ever. This famliy's dysfunction, as suits their creator's temperament and perspective, is at an absolute fever pitch as the picture begins. A funeral oration shot from several majestic angles gives way to a shadow-puppet-enacted precis of this clan's situation—the parent's first son is diagnosed with a wasting disease in his first years; his younger sister's bone marrow, a potential solution, doesn't match; a son is conceived, largely for the purpose of curing the first; his marrow's also a bust; the first son dies, only four years old; the couple have one more son.
And now, half a lifetime later mother Junon (Catherine Deneuve) seems to have contracted a similarly wasting disease, and once again bone marrow is called for. Eldest daughter Elizabeth (Anne Consigny) is a melancholic playwright with a frail, perhaps schizophrenic, teenage son. Youngest brother Ivan (Melville Poupad) is a cheery self-made nonentity with a beautiful wife (Chiarra Mastroianni) and two antic sons. And middle brother Henri (Mathieu Amalric) is a self-destructive half-maniac whom Elizabeth has essentially banished from the family after bailing him out of his last big jam.

And that, as they say, ain't the half of it.

The creation of such a vivid, individualized group of characters and such a compelling roster of dilemmas is a staggering enough feat. But what makes this movie such a darkly exuberant feast is Desplechin's storytelling. Calling his directorial style "eclectic" simply doesn't do. He has packed himself an almost inexhaustible kit bag of cinematic techniques that he deploys here with an ease that makes his previous film, the incredibly impressive Kings and Queen, look relatively forced. Not only is there not a single dull moment in this two-and-a-half-hour family drama; the film practically teems with ferocious moments, and the novelistic detail offered by Desplechin (here collaborating on the screenplay with longtime writing partner Emmanuel Bourdieu) is always spot-on.

To say Amalric is first among equals here is both possibly accurate and deeply unfair. But he is faced here with the challenge of starting out real crazy, and then having to become crazier still. He does it without ever resorting to cliche or overplaying. The bit wherein he literally falls flat on his face after a wobbly sidewalk dance is an instant classic. But by the same token, I not only haven't even gotten into how great the rest of the cast is, I haven't even named some of the other incredible performers giving their best in this picture—so here are two: Emmanuelle Davos, as the mysterious, sardonic girlfriend Henri brings to the family's Christmas gathering, and Jean-Paul Roussillon as the clan's enigmatic, jazz-loving patriarch. Which leads me into the film's staggering use of music...

But I'm gushing. As I will. Un Conte de Noel sets an extremely high bar for the Competition films to come.

Three Monkeys (Competition)

...that said, you might not be surprised at my expressing disappointment over the latest from Turkish director Nuri Bilge Ceylan, whose alienated omantic drama Climates blew me away here in 2006. Three Monkeys (the title refers to the ones who don't speak, see, or hear any evil; thankfully, the film itself never explicitly evokes that image) is also a family drama, also haunted by a dead son, and while it's compellingly performed and often beautifully shot (in the same digital video format Ceylan used for Climates), it's largely commonplace, drear, and claustrophobic. One finds oneself frustrated by the stories Ceylan chooses not to tell—the would-be politician who sets the film's plot into motion seems a more interesting character than anybody in the family whose lives he effects—and by his too-insistent emphases, e.g., a bit involving an idiosyncratic ring tone that's funny and wrenching the first time, still effective the second, and stale the third. The movie's not bad, but it's not terribly special, either.

And in any case, Ceylan's reluctance to explore Turkish politics after bringing them up in the first place may cost him big with this year's Cannes jury. At the jury press conference the other day, its president Sean Penn, no doubt relishing his new-found power, said something along the lines of (I don't have the exact words in front of me, damnit) "We have to teach directors they need to be conscious of the world that we live in." Whatever you say, Kommisar. Although that'll be tough in this case, as all the movies you're judging have, you know, already been made and all.

Is this guy a dick, or what?

Comments

[bill]

Jesus. Sean Penn is out of his mind. Your "Kommisar" jab is dead on, but of course he is utterly incapable, I believe, of understanding the implications of what he's saying.

Damn. Despite having sorta-kinda said something, I'm basically speechless.

[Dan]

Wow. You just did what years of embarrassing antics, loudmouthed proclamations, and "I Am Sam" couldn't: make me hate Sean Penn. That's really, really horrible.

On the bright side, it means I can safely skip the Palm d'Or winner this year...

[Claire K.]

I'm really looking forward to the scene in Un Conte de Noel when Amalric dares Deneuve to put her tongue on a frozen lamppost and it gets stuck there. Should be a riot.

[Jason]

Sean Penn is a humourless man, so it doesn't surprise me that he's constantly saying obnoxious things.

Since I despise Christmas-themed movies (my better half forces me to watch Love Actually every bloody year), I'd probably really enjoy Un Conte de Noel. Hopefully it will come to a screen near me in the near future.

[Aaron Hillis]

Bravo, Clairester. Next up is Clint Eastwood's flick in which George C. Scott holes up in a mansion with the ghosts of murdered children.

[cadavra]

Sean Penn at a Friar's Roast: "First of all, Mr. Youngman, I do not want your wife. And even if I did, she is a human being, not some commodity to be bartered about in a male-dominated society. The choice is hers and hers alone. If you no longer wish to be her husband, there are legal methods to achieve this. That is why we have the American judicial system."

[Jinxy McDeath]

There's a lot of bandwagon jumping on Sean Penn when the person can't even site correctly what Sean said or what the context was, or what is was from. He's the furthest thing from a dick you could meet. In any event twisting something that may or may not have even been said is just sad. Think for yourselves, you sheep.

[Glenn Kenny]

Jinxy, if you could point me to a more "accurate" version of the quote that refutes my interpretation, I'd be happy to eat my words. As for context, well, okay; after his statement about "teaching" directors he averred, "Most of all, we will listen to the film's heart." Following an implied threat with a soft bromide is a pretty old rhetorical switcheroo that generally indicates you should take the threat more seriously.
Also: Baaaah.

[cadavra]

Sorry, he IS a dick. One day, he was walking hesitantly in the hallway outside my office, as if unsure where he was going. My assistant poked her head out the door and asked if he needed any help. He snapped, "I don't need your fucking help!" and stomped off. Cursing angrily at a poor innocent woman who was just trying to be kind is unconscionable, no matter how bad a mood you're in.

[Toni]

I love Christmas movies.. but this is a little outside of the norm and that's what makes it so wonderful.. it's less about Christmas and more about the intricacy of each of the characters and how they interact with one another.. no one can make dysfunctional look more normal and natural than this family..a little too long for my liking, but a must see none the less. enjoy.. if you can get your hands on it..!