Gentille

This movie is simply the product of a genius. If you watch it in french without understanding it, if you don't like Beckett-like plots, if you don't like Paris, if you are looking for a-story-that-works this is not for you. This was the first film i saw by Sophie Fillières -avant prèmiere at the Cinémathéque francaise- and I bet she's to Paris what Allen is to Manhattan. It's too early to say, but i hope she won't deceive us. Dialogs are amazing, situations are paradoxical, even the soundtrack is exactly what it has to be (she said it was too expensive, but et the end she kept it). A smart comedy as you won't find a lot in Europe.

I saw this film at the 2005 Toronto International Film Festival.

Gentille is the second feature film from Sophie Fillières, who both wrote and directed. Fontaine Leglou (played by Emmanuelle Devos) is an anesthesiologist in a private clinic. She has a scientist boyfriend (Bruno Todeschini) who is constantly trying to figure out how to get her to accept his proposal of marriage. But Fontaine is a bit adrift in her life, moving through a series of slightly absurd situations. She finds herself drawn to a patient in the clinic, a doctor (Lambert Wilson) who has to be induced into narcosis, and he may help her to define what she actually wants out of life.

This film is definitely odd, from the characters to the situations they encounter. Fontaine is a little bit scatterbrained and eccentric, challenging a man in the street who she thinks is following her then inviting him for coffee, or her reaction to an engagement ring hidden in her yogurt. The characters were a little too offbeat and odd, rather than quirky, for me to be completely engaged, and the interaction between Fontaine and her patient seemed rather peripheral. Emmanuelle Devos was kind of interesting to watch, and it was nice seeing Lambert Wilson in a dramatic role rather than in a Hollywood blockbuster, but overall the film never really clicked with me.

Just seen this at the London Film Festival. While Gentille does have its moments of genuine humour and gentle pathos, it feels like four or five films stitched together. The writer- director seems uncertain which of many possible stories she wants to tell and ends up developing none of them. Emmanuelle Devos works hard at turning her lead role into something meaty, but she is confounded by the film-maker's lack of conviction and apparent tentativeness over what the film is really about. Is it a mid-life crisis? A sex comedy? A study of intimacy - or of insanity? Well, it seems it's all these things and less.

Many of the characters come and go in piecemeal fashion, never properly introduced, abandoned almost as soon as they have entered the stage. The film's best bits put together might make an enjoyable short, but it wouldn't give the viewer any further insight into the main protagonist's mindset.

The result is a pleasant, harmless but ultimately dissatisfying and rather whimsical character study; like snacking on several entrées but not having a full meal.

Watching this film you would surely be thanking your stars that such films are still made in France. I am saying this as not many people in this world would venture out watching films like this leave alone filmmakers directing it and producers putting their money. "Gentille" is one of those charming "face in the crowd" film which has "living next door" look. Much of the film's happiness comes in the form of its leading lady Mlle Emmanuelle Devos. As she is in love, she decides to experience a series of lighter moments which would maker her life worthwhile. The gallic capital Paris is also nicely depicted in this film especially some scenes near an infamous pipeline called Centre Pompidou.Do not despair if you are not able to ascertain whether this film makes any sense or not. At first viewing it might not be easy for a casual viewer to figure out what Sophie Filliere is talking about. It is only with repeated viewings that some sense could be made out.

Emmanuelle Devos is a wonder to behold in Gentille, which is something of a wonder in itself. Some of the American reviewers of this film seem to have a problem in 'labelling' or 'placing' it -- there are, in other words, no common comedic 'markers' to roll audiences into the aisles.

The film is, in fact, very funny, and it's meant to be. It's all in the characters' posturing, glances and nuances, both tacit and spoken. If you don't pay attention, you'll be scatching in too many places.

Devos plays a doctor in a clinic, and the viewer is never really sure if she, like the always-brilliant Lambert Wilson (and just about everyone else in this film), is either flat-out nuts or well on the way. Characters are frequently asking: 'Don't I know you?'; 'What are you looking at?' or 'Do you see me?' They are always fearful of either being forgotten, or not being recognized, or being mistaken for someone else. Names and words become mangled (no one seems to know Wilson's full name, so he ends up being called Philippe Philippe). It's a film about identity and recognition, the nature of what is real and what isn't, and if we can ever really know each other.

This thematic motif is consistent throughout the film, yet American critics will miss it if they are looking for those familiar 'markers' that denote so many obvious American 'comedies'.

Maybe you have to be a true believer in French-style send-ups to really appreciate this gem. Everyone is off-centre here, and that's the way writer-director Sophie Fillieres wants us to view her world. I like her world, because to me it has a strong philosophical ring to it. The film is uniquely French or European in general: taking profound themes and somehow turning them into brilliant comedy, with nary a wacky chase or a pratfall in sight.

The 10 minutes with the marvelous Michael Lonsdale, playing a barely contained nutcase who may -- or may not be -- Devos's future father-in-law, is a masterwork of understated, classic comedic acting. Bandaged, bearded and bedraggled, he explains how he 'recovered' his place in the world, his 'dignity' if you will, after two years of begging on the streets while pretending to be in Costa Rica. His intensity while telling Devos that he watched his wife passing him every day and 'not seeing me' (that motif again) is worth the price of this DVD alone. The acting in this film is first-rate, much like the film itself.