Les soeurs fâchées

I'm very surprised to find not a single comment on such a class act. Okay, it's a new release but it IS five days old now. Anyhow it's so good to see that Isabelle Huppert has temporarily abandoned her apparent avowed intent to plumb the depths of sleaze in her ongoing trawl through the sewers of the world and return to what she does better than most actresses anyplace, anytime, anywhere that this could be a stinker and it would still be a breath of fresh air. As it happens it's anything but and Huppert and Catherine Frot are twin delights. Huppert is the chic, snobbish wife living in the right arrondissement, checking accounts in all the right places and the right kind of husband to pick up the tab. The wonderful Francis Berleand scores as the unfaithful husband who can't stand sister-in-law Frot; normally that's not a problem since Frot lives in the provinces but now she's written a book and has come to town to rubber-stamp a publishing deal and will spend three days with Huppert and Berleand. What we have is a very low-key take on Neil Simon's Odd Couple with Frot being everything Huppert is not and vice versa. Frot, fresh from playing a Tyrant's Tyrant in Vipere au poing turns up here as the kind of lovable kook that Shirley MacLaine was always being cast as but could never quite bring off because she couldn't do lovable (she couldn't do kook either if anybody ask you but that's another story), and she shows Maclaine just how it's done.

Okay, we're talking soufflé here but it's a French soufflé, hand-made at Maxim's. Eat, Enjoy.

Huppert plays a monster. Well not a villain, but there are actual villains in the movies that I've found easier to watch. Only the light French-style early Modern musical score tips the viewer that this story won't end in tragedy (a murder or suicide, say). So the viewer indeed knows where the movie is going from the music, that self-awareness will ultimately blossom and this beast will finally humanize herself.

But that said, I felt that the ending wasn't earned. Did they tack on a happy ending for improved world-of-mouth just to sell tickets? It comes so out-of-nowhere that you can't even call it a deus ex machina. In real life you don't get to cross the bridges you burn just because you have had a change of heart. Hurting people matters It's not just not realism, the ending is sugar-coated wish-fulfillment for audience approval.

The script is mostly very light on back story, but there is an emphasis on the unseen mother's alcoholism, Martine's intension of abstinence, and what a mean drunk she turns into when she falls off the wagon. So I read this as one of the movie's themes, namely the perpetual anger of recovering alcoholic, so, jilted by the lover alcohol and now unable to feel human love (whether for spouse, child, sister or mother). This may seem like a very narrow reading, but the script supports it, and if you buy my reading, you can use it as handle for finding some sympathy for the otherwise utterly irredeemable Martine.

Catherine Frot really steals the picture. Just what she does with her face alone to show her connection to the music while listening ,at the theater, to the first few bars of an opera is acting gold of the highest merit.

This comedy of manners depicts too opposite sisters in a satire that is too crude and clichéd to be really moving. The Paris/province (rest of France)divide is a source of inspiration for many French comedies but the rotten humor and the engaging characters cannot make up for the very predictable plot.

Some moments are really funny though, there is a kind of tenderness in the caricatured portrait of each sister so all in all it's not such a bad try for a first film.

Eventually it's more a duel of two styles of acting, an encounter of 2 different actress with their own class. Not exactly a good film but a pleasant shot.

Well I have not seen the movie yet and will have to wait 10 hours for this to happen. My point to come here is to talk about the lack of thinking behind the tittling in English. "My sister and I" is not even search able for this film and returns an Italian film. I had to look at Isabelle Huppert's credit to find it and had to be or at least understand french to get the right movie. I wish original tittles were also given in reviews. I will not suggest a more appropriate tittle although i could think of a couple and have to admit that literal translation does not work too well here. I did like what other have written about it and am looking forward for a spicy time tonight :) and will come back to put my five cents of thoughts on it. MB

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June 2008!I'm not permitted to make another entry so I added this here. I'm quite surprised on two counts, 1) My 2004 comment came up with the main page! and 2) There are so few entries for this tittle, it really deserves better. "Me and My Sister" (In French "the sisters crossed with each others")was screened on our Sydney TV last Sunday. I had an idea I saw it before! But decided to watch it again. I can't remember exactly my feelings about it when I first saw it at the cinema (that I was supposed to report on!). However I did enjoy very much the second viewing. The contrast of these two characters is so well exposed and acted out. The provincial sister is actually quite thick and although the Parisian resort to extreme nastiness you can't help to feel for her who lives so much in such a superficial world, yes she's only a facade of success. She's pitiful but fits well this superficial world. But she's not naive or stupid and so get much hurt from her "Simple Simone" sister oozing with goodness and who turns into a high achiever. I thought it was an interesting ride and not boring in the least. The ending tries to tell you that blood is thicker than high emotions - So be it. Thank you for some much better written entries I read a while ago and to which I can well associate with and would have like to write myself as an ex Parisian but who spent more time in rural regions I have experienced a little of both "status"!- Even during my military service, and here obviously talking about men, the Parisian snobbery was still apparent and sometimes subject of "down to earth" reactions! But here no such a thing, yet it's riveting at times. MM

The film "Les Soeurs fachees" is very moving. It really comes alive because of the two extraordinary lead actresses. Especially the wonderful Isabelle Huppert. She is amazing the way she can express emotions, during the movie, without saying a word. You can read it all in her beautiful face. During the movie you get to know, nearly in every scene, how different these sisters are. The cold, unhappy Martine and the nice and friendly Louise. It proofs how important are goals for you life, and it's never to late to change something,to become happy. A wonderful true french film, refreshing, charming, sad, might make you laugh and cry. Loved it. I would definitely recommend it to everyone who loves great cinema with talented actors, and dislikes Hollywood Studio Movies.