Mai sulla bocca

Alain Resnais, like a lot of brilliant people, can be interesting even when he's not very entertaining. But in Not on the Lips, he's not even really that interesting.

I liked the way the movie began, with the cute credits and the opening shot with the women singing. At that point I had high hopes. As the empty-headed characters chattered, I thought perhaps this was an Oscar- Wilde/Noel Coward sort of thing that would mock the upper classes.

But as I watched further, I began to feel that instead, this was just a rather tedious trifle that has nothing to say. So I looked it up on wikipedia, which says it's an old operetta and that Resnais purposely made it as originally intended. Apparently that chatter was supposed to be interesting.

I rather liked the music, although it's disconcerting when the subtitles don't bother to rhyme (sometimes they do, sometimes not). It's got a nice look to it. But about a third of the way through I just couldn't see how I could stand anymore of this superficial claptrap, and I stopped watching.

This film is about a woman whose husband is not aware that she married an American guy before. Chaos breaks out when the American husband is invited to their home.

The film takes place entirely inside the beautiful residence of a rich couple. Sets are lavish, costumes are dazzlingly beautiful as a result. The songs are fun and got this nostalgic feel to it. The entangled relationships between the seven characters are entertaining to watch, and they kept me intrigued as to how things will turn out between them. Even though it was not easy to catch up with the subtitles, it was still delightful to watch.

"Not on the Lips" is a fun, light hearted, old style musical. I was told that this style is called "operetta", and I am liking my first exposure to operetta.

Alain Resnais was extremely comfortable with opulence in 'Last Year at Marienbad', and Alain Robbe-Grillet felt right at home in this, with his serialized writing. I hadn't thought that much about this taste for luxury till I saw his 2003 film of Andre Barde's 1925 operetta, 'Pas Sur la Bouche.'

This is easily one of the lightest, most exquisite filmed musicals ever made, and quite as unexpected a thing as possible in this age. There are some modern aspects: the luxury is greater luxury than in the past, but does not ever seem like gluttony; it is not like an exhibition of 100 Burne-Jones paintings, for example, which was about the number in a 1999 exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum here--and that many at once makes one fairly sick.

All of the songs are charming, and even the one ugly one is (but only because it is only one; it is truly unpleasant to the ear and could have been styled better even with such meager material): this is the song that Eric Thomson (played by Lambert Wilson) sings with Arlette (Isabelle Nanty) when he is discovered to be doing business with George Valandray (Pierre Arditi) as well as being Valandray's wife Gilberte's (Sabine Azema) first husband (their American-produced marriage was not recognized upon her return to France, although her reasons for dissatisfaction with him are not made entirely clear). Thomson's French seems to have disappeared and he keeps responding to Arlette with "Whaddya say?" and "Whaddya know?" and this is irritating and does not even particularly form a purposeful dissonance with the rest of the graceful and casually elegant Parisian-style music. However, it is followed quickly by a group song when everyone is about to sit down to a "simple meal," which looks rather more as if composed by Escoffier or Pelleprat, and, very campily, Thomson's French reappears as if by magic as he joins all the French people in their tuneful paean to the repast they will consume (in silence, one wishes, but cannot hope for.) This "magical device" is subtle enough to be a considerable improvement over the "spontaneous" bursting into song by the wedding party at "I Say a Little Prayer for You" in 'My Best Friend's Wedding.'

The luscious orchestrations of the songs remind one of the Marguerite Monnot-Alexandre Breffort score for 'Irma La Douce'--as in "Dis-donc," and decades of this kind of sound at the Casino de Paris, at the Folies Bergere.

There is a lot of red, many plummy reds, in the lavish sets, but it is not discordant. One does notice that the film is almost entirely set in interiors, and the courtyard of witchlike (and sublimely hilarious) Mme. Foin (Darry Cowl) is about the only contact with a little remembrance of sky one sees; but this is usual for sex farce.

Everyone is involved with everyone, and it's so silly that only in the viewing does it have life; in the retelling it doesn't have a grain of substance, so I am not going to bother. The players are uniformly characterful and theatrical, and Sabine Azema is superlatively middle-aged-sexy and spirited, while Jalil Lespert has the biggest Frenchest face since Maurice Chevalier: He's truly a major talent. Audrey Tautou seems to be imitating Twiggy in 'the Boyfriend' sometimes, which is cool enough.

In my opinion, I didn't know that this was a musical comedy. The French make the best films around with character driven story lines. This film has a first rate cast but I didn't care for Lambert Wilson's performance as the American, Eric Thomson. I did love Isabelle Nanty as Arlette, the old maid. She was perfect and memorable. Arlette's sister, Gilberte, has a problem. She has three men in her life including her unsuspecting second husband who thinks he's her first, her first American husband, Eric Thomson, who comes to Paris on business, and a young male artist/teacher Charly who prefers older women. The film is first rate in art direction, costumes, music, casting, and writing. I felt Lambert Wilson was out of place and out of tune as the American. But still, this film has memorable characters and can cheer you right up.

If I hadn't read his name on the DVD cover, I never would have suspected that this rather gushy and old fashioned musical was made by a man so closely associated with the French New Wave. In fact, the film is so far from that, that I wonder if back in the 50s and 60s, New Wave auteurs would have absolutely hated this type of film--it's so...so...unreal. And, it seems to have little to do with so many of his previous films. This isn't necessarily a bad thing--just a very surprising thing.

What I also found a bit surprising was the amount of praise some of the reviewers gave this film--especially when there are so many better French musicals out there. The songs in this film were simply not particularly interesting and the characters all seemed so bland and stereotypical. If I had to see another rich person who fretted about how hard it is to be rich or get a good sale price on a designer outfit, I was going to puke.

The bottom line is that like American musicals, not every French musical is gold. This film is not another "Les parapluies de Cherbourg" (UMBRELLAS OF CHERBOURG or "Huit Femmes" (EIGHT WOMEN) and despite the presence of Audrey Tautou, I can't see much reason to recommend it as anything other than a dull oddity.