Desperate
Visions
by
Howard Schumann
A frumpy cleaning woman well into middle age is discovered
by an art critic to be a painter with talent comparable to Vincent Van
Gogh. Her story is told in the riveting Seraphine,
directed by Martin Provost and winner of seven Césars, the French
version of the Oscars, including a best actress award for Yolande Moreau.
With a screenplay by Martin Provost and Marc Abdelnour, the film is
set in the village of Senlis outside of Paris where Séraphine
Louis (Moreau) lives alone and must take odd jobs just to pay for her
painting supplies. Séraphine is a visionary, a devout Catholic
who believes she is guided by a guardian angel and her exotic paintings
of flowers and plants describe her feelings of closeness to spirit.
Treated with
disdain by her condescending employer, her life takes on new meaning
when a tenant, German art critic Wilhelm Uhde (Ulrich Tukur) hires Séraphine
to clean for him and accidentally discovers one of her paintings that
her boss had tossed aside. A champion of modern “primitivist”
artists who is credited with early recognition of Picasso and Rousseau,
Uhde is portrayed by Tukur as a quiet, unassuming man who lives with
his sister and a gay lover. He recognizes Séraphine’s talent
but never shows much enthusiasm, preferring to keep their relationship
on a very business-like basis.
Impressed
by Seraphine’s passionate art, Uhde offers to become her patron
but, feeling estranged in France, must soon leave the country to return
to Germany as the First World War begins. Although Séraphine
continues to paint, she has no connection with Uhde until the latter
part of the 1920s when he provides her with the means to quit her job
and paint full time. Unfortunately, her grip on reality falters and
she is soon hospitalized after indulging in spending sprees on a wedding
dress and purchase of a large mansion. One of the saddest scenes in
the film is that of Séraphine dressed in a full wedding gown,
going door to door giving away her possessions.
Provost captures
the artist’s mystical nature and her close bond with nature that
shows up in her works, which are still exhibited in many of the world’s
museums. She is shown hugging trees, climbing them, and standing as
a tiny speck beneath a towering shade tree. One scene shows her standing
nude in water up to her chest in a nearby river. Provost takes a minimalist
approach and the film does not contain much dialogue. The story is told
by the silences and facial expressions, and the music by Michael Galasso
adds richness to the experience. Fully capturing the eternal mystery
of the creative process, Séraphine is itself a work
of art.
*
Julien
(Vincent Lindon) is an unprepossessing French teacher, happily married
to Lisa (Diane Kruger), a wife he deeply loves. Their idyllic suburban
life is rudely interrupted, however, when the police shockingly crash
their home and arrest Lisa on suspicion of the brutal murder of her
boss. With Lisa’s fingerprints on the weapon, and the victim’s
blood on her jacket, she is found guilty and sentenced to twenty years
in prison. If you like your suspense powerful and unnerving, do not
hesitate to seek out Anything For Her (Pour
Elle), the debut effort of French director Fred Cavayé,
an enormously entertaining thriller that delivers a high level of satisfaction.
Imprisoned
for a crime she probably did not commit (the director offers two possible
scenarios but it is clear which one is the more likely), Lisa, still
proclaiming her innocence, faces long, dark days ahead without her husband
and their young son Oscar (Lancelot Roch). Overwhelmed with sadness,
Julien becomes single-minded in his drive to reunite the family. After
three years, when his attorney tells him that Lisa stands no chance
before the Appeals Court and Lisa becomes suicidal, refusing to take
her insulin shots, Julien knows that he must take matters into his own
hands and will stop at nothing to accomplish his goal.
Locating an
ex-con who has written books about his attempts to break out of jail,
Julien convinces him to tutor him on the do’s and don’ts
of prison escape, telling the ex-con that he wants to teach the author’s
experience to his students. His ultimate plan, though, is not revealed
either to Lisa, Julien’s parents (Liliane Rovere and Olivier Perrier),
or to the audience, which serves to greatly enhance the suspense. To
save the woman he loves from certain death in prison, however, Julien
must transform himself from laid-back school teacher to action hero,
pushing himself far beyond the limits of what is reasonable. While attempting
to obtain false papers and new identities, he comes into contact with
some very unpleasant local criminal types and finds himself no longer
reluctant to use violence to accomplish his ends.
Supported
by an excellent script by the director, outstanding cinematography by
Alain Duplaintier, and a moody score by Klaus Badelt, Anything For
Her is entertaining, riveting, and ultimately a very moving love
story. None of it would be very convincing, however, if not for the
outstanding performances of Kruger and especially Lindon, whose sudden
personality change requires great skill to pull off. Lindon’s
eyes convey powerful emotion that is not desperation but a strong and
unyielding determination that serves as a catalyst for the events that
build to the film’s heart pounding climax. Although Anything
For Her has been criticized for being “implausible,”
when an individual’s every act is consumed with passion and overwhelming
intention, then the implausible will most certainly become the expected.
©2009 Howard Schumann
CineScene
