Les destinées sentimentales

I just saw this picture and it gave me the impression of Assayas trying to give us a symbolic message on globalization, French versus American markets, and at the end he delivers a movie about the film industry itself.As they say, do it for the French market!

Cinematography is at its best, rhythm of images goes perfectly along character´s feelings at the moment.

Beautiful ball sequence and very good explanation on ceramic and china industry at beginning of 20th century, breath taking swiss sceneries.

I WW sequence is also very well done.

Emmanuelle Beart and Isabelle Huppert are splendorous,La Huppert appears less but is much more intense.

Also got the impression that novel had much more to offer than the 3 hours film version, but this is film, anyway, and script is script.

Beginning and ending with a death scene, love is the only worthy thing in life.

This film isn't exactly about the most exciting topic, china from Limoges, France, though it turned out to be a dandy film. It's a very lengthy film (almost 3 hours) that takes a very leisurely stroll through the adult life of a husband and wife--chronicling the husband's assumption of control of a family business and the ensuing ups and downs of this business. Once again, I know this doesn't sound very good to watch, but it is--particularly if you don't mind a long movie. I especially liked the way the characters changed throughout the film and the message the film gives that you cannot lose sight of your loved ones on your way to fortune.

About the only negative I can think of in the movie is the inconsistency of the makeup. While the two main characters age well throughout the film and definitely appear quite old when the film concludes, for some odd reason Isabelle Huppert looks pretty much the same throughout (even though at least 25 years had passed from when you first saw her until you last saw her in the movie), as did one other minor character. Oh well, it's certainly not enough to damage the movie significantly--just an odd little flaw.

For the first time Assayas has left the contemporary Paris settings of his films and tried his hands on a period picture, set in a small village in the South, a china factory in Limoges, the Swiss Alps and on the battlefields of WW1. The film is a brave attempt to revive Luchino Visconti`s lavish epics but unfortunately lacks the Italian`s breath. The story could have easily been told in 90 minutes (instead of 180!), and even if some scenes and locations look gorgeous (especially the ballroom-scene!) and Assayas` (and cameraman Eric Gautier`s) usual trademark, the nervous camerawork, goes down well with a period picture, all that isn`t enough to hold our attention for such a long time. Nothing in this films can really surprise us, not even the beauty of Emmanuelle Beart or the acting quality of Isabelle Huppert, and as the film potters along one hopes Assayas will rapidly go contemporary again. Not really bad but definitely ways apart from the quality of his earlier films.

Chardonne's novel is a masterfully written tale about two characters as they spiral through and explore love as life's most essential element. The director captured it beautifully as a tone, a feeling, and as an overall impression of how the characters react to their journey. Unfortunately, he left out the milestones, those transitions a character makes, inwardly, as outward events bear in on them. The audience is asked to make gigantic leaps of logic as the character's trust in and dependence on Love changes, evolves with age. Mind you this is a three hour epic, so it is not for want of time that the production misses the mark, only the screenwriter's discipline, and here, again, the director got involved where he ought not be.

This exquisite three hour film, set in France, begins at 1900 and ends around 1930, covering in the way three decades in the life of an idealistic man, Jean Barnery, who, although began as an protestant priest, ended up becoming an industrialist in his family porcelain factory. Through the life of a complex character, a full web of compromises, illusions, deceptions, tragedies, and mistakes emerges, capturing accurately the conflictual transformations of the era as a relation to the hero's personal journey. Despite its novelistic structure that sometimes diminishes its dramatic power through big time lapses, the film manages to retain its own life and conviction through careful development of its main ideas that pervade the whole story: The unavoidable compromises, the vicissitudes of life, the difficulty in applying your ideals, the emotional fulfillment and the problems of commitment, the futility of things. Easy answers are not provided, sometimes questions are more important. Exquisitely directed by the talented Olivier Assayas, and wonderfully performed (Emanuelle Beart and Charles Berling give subtle and nuanced performances, capturing perfectly the transitions in their characters' emotional state) the film, contrary to other period pieces, never lags despite the length. A must see for people interested in a serious piece of filmmaking.