Les Gens d'à côté

The director André Téchiné is not a new comer in the French film industry, he began his career in the seventies and still continues. His films are a bit too academic to me, different from the other new and younger director's work, even for similar plots and atmopsheres. His stories are more or less always in relation with recent actual stories, dramas, tragedies...Here it is question of a female cop, whose husband - also a police officer - commited suicide with his gun. This is not a crime drama though, despite the cop element. It remains a drama and character study, thhe Téchiné's trademark. Isabelle Huppert is as convincing as usual and the story inteersting enough - maybe not riveting - to entertain you.

An intimate drama set against the backdrop of the yellow jackets ("jill et john") demonstrations ; the heroine's partner committed suicide , a tragedy which often happens in today's police nowadays ......

Herself a police woman ,Lucie does not know where she stands anymore ; her boss suggests she take a break ; her brother-in-law ,a colleague, tries to use her as an informer......she has a ringside seat .....

......because her new friends are on probation ;this is a weird but endearing friendship between a cop and a couple with daughter ,Rose .Yann is the man with the child in his eyes, a grown up kid ;an artist and an activist , he's also very naive because his way to change the world is as old as the hills and endangers his family ; it's interesting to notice that Lucie conceals her occupation, as though she was ashamed of it (although in the past she worked with the homeless, much to her credit);Hasfia Herzi is true to form as usual ,but it's hard to believe that,in that context,she's a teacher .The fact that Lucie's late husband and his brother ,who came from Africa when they were children belong to the well-assimilated populations (whom they protect at that!) whereas Yann lives on the fringes of society is not derivative ;and Lucie's attitude ,when she eventually helps him at her great expense , makes her a rebel against the power-that-be too .Since, the ghost of her departed love has stopped visiting her. That means a lot.

The story is more a fable than a realistic story ,and the last pictures verge on melodrama ,but the relationship between a widow and an unconventional family remains very interesting .