Tanya Batson-Savage, Staff Reporter
FRENCH FILM icon Catherine Deneuve gives a great performance in Place Vendóme, which is directed by Nicole Garcia and written by Garcia and Jacques Fieshi. The performance earned Deneuve her ninth Best Actress nomination for France's Cesar awards.
The 1999 film is just one in a very long career that dates back to the 1960s.
Denueve's character, Marianne Malivert, is the first aspect of the production to arrest attention. She is used as the central point to draw one into an intriguing web.
When we first meet Marianne, she is a rather tragic figure desperately seeking either amnesia or escape at the bottom of a wine bottle or even in other people's leftover wine.
JEWELLERY SHOP
Marianne is the wife of Vincent Malivert (Bernard Fresson), the director of a respected Parisian jewellery shop in the Place Vendóme, home to haute couture jewellery. Marianne's life is surrounded by beautiful jewels, but though diamonds should be a girl's best friend, Marianne's seemed to have betrayed her.
Vincent's death forces Marianne to arise from her drunken stupor. Her return to the wagon brings with it all the ugly forces that remaining drunk had allowed her to ignore. As a part of her return to the real world Marianne discovers a small cache of diamonds her husband left behind. A rather multifaceted plot is created around these diamonds and Marianne.
GRITTY WORK
The film, a dark, almost gritty work, begins in a manner that reflects Marianne's detachment from reality. The film begins with the parts of the plot being very disjointed. At the edges hover the young Nathalie (Emmanuelle Seigner). Nathalie bears a striking resemblance to Marianne and seems to be hurtling toward the older woman's fate.
Nathalie is involved with two men, Jean-Pierre (Jean-Pierre Bacri) and Batistellie (Jacques Dutronc). Both men have a greater role to play than their relationship with Nathalie first suggests.
As Marianne begins to take control of her life the relationships between herself and the various characters begin to take shape. Like the diamonds, which also play a very important role in the film, Marianne's role is multi-faceted and she is also much stronger than she first appeared.
She is transformed from a woman who had clearly lost hope, living from one glass of wine to the next, to one who is willing to go on with her life whatever comes. Before his death, Vincent once asked her what she would do without him; apparently she fares much better after his passing than when he was alive.
Rather than falling for the emotional mess that Marianne is deep in, Deneuve only gives glimpses of the internal turmoil. She becomes a character who is semi-detached from reality, just enough so that she can cope. Stealthily avoiding high drama, her performance is quiet, with echoes of grace and beauty, and is etched with detailed nuances.
Place Vendóme is certainly for those who enjoy a quiet mystery, where the real intrigue lies in the hidden facets of the personalities at work. The film will be showing at the Sovereign Cineplex on Tuesday, November 18. It is a part of the Francophone Film Festival organised by Alliance Francaise, in conjunction with the diplomatic missions of France and Canada.
Other films included in the festival are The Invention of Love and The Red Violin Canada; Little Senegal and Have a Safe Journey France; Genesis Mali/France; The Carriers are Waiting Belgium; and Life on Earth - Mauritania.
