Today will be a rather short one as we only saw one movie yesterday evening. Today will also be our movie break day so, if I find the time at some point, I’ll publish a bit later about some of the nice exhibitions we have seen during our Venetian stay (quite a few interesting things to see).
But first, yesterday’s screening. To be honest, I went in there quite reluctantly. When you know Stéphane Brizé and you see that Vincent Lindon has been casted (again), there is a 99% chance that you are going to watch one of Brizé’s socially engaged movies (such as “La loi du marché” or “un autre monde”). Again, don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against socially engaged movies. It’s just that, as Brizé produces one every second year, the potential for surprise is quite low. On the other hand, the last time he sidelined and produced something different (“Hors Saison”), the experience proved to be quite unsuccessful (to say the least).
The dread caught me when the movie started and Alba Rohrwacher’s name appeared on the screen (this information I had skipped). A sudden envy to run away came to my mind. Not only did Rohrwacher star in the already mentioned and extremely painful “Hors Saison” but also in many of the bad Italian movies we were confronted with in the past years at the Mostra. Based on this, her name automatically screems bad actress to me.
And this is where the magic of cinema comes in. And where the advantages of a festival shows its full potential – as you end up seeing many movies you would not bother to go and see in your usual cinema. “Un bon petit soldat” ended up being the good surprise of this festival for me. Not in a Golden Lion sense of things. But in a “I really enjoyed it and Alba Rohrwacher is actually a pretty good actress” sense of things. Which is already a lot.
The surprise does not come out of the format – it is a classical and surprise less socially engaged Brizé movie. The theme is an interesting and fully relevant one though, which is already a big plus. It focuses on an HR manager in an insurance company that claims to care for the people and its employees while it does exactly the opposite.
The surprise comes first from the humour that one can find in it. At some moments, you actually have a good laugh and that is not something that appears naturally in Brizé’s cinema. And it really adds to it. One can actually have an openhearted laugh without toning down the pretty dark message one is trying to pass on (this is actually very close to my life’s philosophy). The second surprise comes, as already said, from Alba Rohrwacher’s performance which is extremely strong. Her emotions and uneasiness show on her face without her needing to say anything. She honestly blew me away. A really good (and, let me say it again) surprising watch!
Leave a Reply