Release date: October 20, 2010
Directed by Guillaume Canet
With François Cluzet, Marion Cotillard, Benoît Magimel, Gilles Lellouche, Jean Dujardin, Laurent Lafitte, Valérie Bonneton, Pascale Arbillot, Joel Dupuch, Anne Marivin
Running time: 02h34min
© EuropaCorp Distribution
Under different conditions, I went to see the film twice. The first time, I must admit, it made my stomach churn a little. Well, not that… But still… I left the cinema after 2 hours and 34 minutes, feeling quite affected, my mind wandering, and once again concerned by the violent storm of those big questions about “What is friendship? The second time around, it was longer and considerably less painful. The anticipation of the humorous notes had already overtaken the desire to join my neighbor on the right in tears. All right, so when – once again – Maxim Nucci let himself go and sang “Talk to me”, I was a little nervous.
Marion Cotillard © Jean-Claude LOTHER / 2010 LES PRODUCTIONS DU TRESOR - EUROPACORP - CANEO FILMS - M6 FILMS
The film asks, “How does this affect you? So, as a spokesperson, during the ups and downs of a drunken evening, I asked the guys a few questions (Only the first names have been changed to preserve the anonymity of the protagonists). Annick told me: “The film speaks to me too, because you see, I’ve got a real bunch of mates, and it’s very strange, but I even recognized some of them in it”. Mattéa told me that at the end of the film, she had bombarded her mates with text messages to tell them that she loved them more than anything else in the world, and that they were somehow her only real happiness. Stéphane had phoned his lover in Sacramento, California, to apologize for sleeping with other women. Yann told me: “In this fear, under my own skin, facing my sexual orientation, I don’t know if it helps me or not”. Maria hadn’t wanted to talk to me about it.
Gilles Lellouche, Laurent Lafitte, Marion Cotillard © Jean-Claude LOTHER / 2010 LES PRODUCTIONS DU TRESOR - EUROPACORP - CANEO FILMS - M6 FILMS
I wanted to believe that the review would help me approach and understand the emotional phenomenon of the thing, but it was about something else. ” In this case, it’s regression we’re talking about with Les Petits Mouchoirs, a film as empty as its claim to be a milestone: outsized running time, an all-star cast (Cluzet, Cotillard, Magimel in the lead), a soulful soundtrack whose cost alone must exceed the budget of a first auteur film. ” (Aurélien FerencziTélérama). ” Seeing Vincent, François, Paul and the others, released in 1974, the year Valéry Giscard d’Estaing was elected to the French presidency, the film recalls a moment in history, the moment when a generation – that of the Libération – had to pass on the baton. In this film, Piccoli, Montand and Reggiani had the chance to be alternately mediocre and great. Here, all that’s left is mediocrity, which we don’t know if it’s the natural product of existence or the result of betrayal of forgotten (and in any case never mentioned) ideals. ” (Thomas SotinelLe Monde). “The political film: The Little Handkerchiefsin its sociological deployment, is an exact reflection of Sarkozy’s France – himself a regular at Cap-Ferret (the message is clear). Cluzet plays the blinged-out but not too blinged-out upstart; Cotillard, the kind-hearted joint addict who loves music and sleeps with everyone (follow my gaze…); Magimel, as a masseur-physiotherapist, the liberal professions, but sympathetic, close to the people, who learn the meaning of true values from a kind-hearted oyster farmer.” (Les Inrocks).
© Jean-Claude LOTHER / 2010 LES PRODUCTIONS DU TRESOR - EUROPACORP - CANEO FILMS - M6 FILMS
In that case, I don’t know if I’ve seen the same film as the critics. Nor do I know to what extent critics like to be ever more critical. Nor do I know what – all things considered – matters most between “moving people” or “being praised by the critics”. Sometimes, going against the grain seems to me to be – just – a fashionable trend: pretending to sulk or vomit, feigning the desire to leave the theater on the spot, rejecting from the outset any form that’s a little too popular or too commercial, preferring (but clearly) to dismantle everything at once at the risk of having to disarticulate the film’s skeleton in order to highlight what’s good, what’s beautiful, what’s successful, but also what doesn’t work.
PS/A film that’s close to people, and in that, quite simply, accomplished.
PS2/ Week 1, 1,369,812 admissions (Box-Office France, week from October 20 to October 26, 2010). Source :
cbo-boxoffice.com
Elisa Palmer
Cette publication est également disponible en : Français (French)
