Je rentre à la maison

It´s amazing how Manoel de Oliveira, who's 93 years old, accomplishes so much in this film using so little. The story is quite simple and there´s nothing very unusual about the characters. But the film captures the audience´s attention in a remarkable way. We get to know so much about the characters that sometimes we feel that we´re reading a book, when the author has pages and pages to tell everything about them. Michel Picoli plays a successful stage actor who, after losing wife, daughter and son-in-law in a car accident, learns to overcome his grief bringing his young grandson to live with him. Manuel de Oliveira doesn't use exciting camera angles nor spectacular takes. Everything is quite simple in his film. It's the simplicity of a master, who knows perfectly well what's he's doing. Acting is superlative. Picoli's work is on the level of the best performances of Ingmar Bergman's actors. And, of course, there's John Malkovich, with very few lines but an enormous intensity, in the role of an American film director who's shooting a movie version of James Joyce's "Ulysses". This is one of the most intelligent, delicate and touching films I've seen in many years.

"Je rentre a la maison" opens on the stage of a rather seedy theatre in Paris during the closing act of Ionesco's absurdist drama "Exit the King" - exit the king indeed!

Portraying the old king is Gilbert Valence (Michel Piccoli), a well known Parisian actor, who like the king is coming to the end of his career. Piccoli no sooner steps off stage than a group of somber friends deliver to him the bad news that his wife, daughter, and son-in-law have just been killed in an auto accident. All that now remains of his family is his young grandson.

In this remarkably understated film Oliveira uses long takes, a rarely moving camera, and natural background sounds to emphasize what's going on in the faces of his actors. After a summer of films like "Fast and Furious," "Rat Race," and "Rush Hour 2" it is a relief to be able to slow down and indulge in the more subtle nuances of the filmic art.

One of the movie's most treasured moments occurs when Piccoli is cast in an English-language film based on James Joyce's novel, "Ulysses." Appearing in a cameo role as the director of this movie-within-a-movie is John Malkovich who takes full advantage of Oliveira's long take close-ups of him as he sadly watches Piccoli having difficulties with his lines. The last shot in the film is also a long take of the face of Piccoli's grandson as he watches his grandfather pause on the landing while making his way up the stairs to his room.

"Je rentre a la maison" is a low-key version of Scott Hicks' more thickly romantic, "Hearts in Atlantis," which has a similar theme.

"I'm Going Home" - a heady subtitled French character study and contemplation which focuses on a bereaved and aging thespian, Valence (Piccoli) - consumes huge chunks of time as we watch the protag perform on stage, buy shoes, get mugged, get made up for a movie, flub his lines, etc. Deneuve and Malkovich are on screen for a heartbeat and the whole messy death of his family thing is skipped over in deference to the lengthy scenes. I was surprised when the film abruptly ended with no climax, no denouement, and no warning...just poof, credits rolling. The bottom line here is this is not much of a movie by the standards of ordinary filmgoers. However, it is fodder for cinematic devotees, critics and industry people, pedants and dilettantes, etc. If you care about such trivia as the director was 90+ years of age, then you may want to give this film a look. If you just want entertainment, think twice. (B)

Note: Being surprised when the film ended is a good thing. That meant I was sufficiently engrossed as to not be watching the clock. For what it's worth and it's not much, I enjoyed this film a lot.

I'm Going Home [Je rentre à la maison (2001)] is a

masterpiece from Manoel de Oliveira. This film is quiet,

fascinating, and truly memorable. de Oliveira has chosen

the aging, brilliant French actor Michel Piccoli to portray an

aging, brilliant French actor. The combination of skilled

director and skilled actor results in an almost perfect film.

The plot is basic and could be summarized in a paragraph.

What makes this movie a masterpiece is the manner in which

de Oliveira sets up each scene so that it is an organic

entity--linked to the scenes before and after it, but nonetheless

able to stand on its own. Each scene is, in fact, a small

masterpiece.

As an example, Piccoli's character is seated in front of the

mirror, while a makeup artist carefully, skillfully, and

professionally adds makeup. The scene is shot as if

through the mirror, so Piccoli and the makeup person are

looking at us to check the results. A man stands quietly in

the background. At first we don't understand why he is there.

Then, the makeup artists pauses, and the man begins to

place a wig on Piccoli's head. All three of these people are

portrayed as experienced, capable, and clearly expert at what

they do. They work quietly and efficiently in a manner

expected of people who have done this before, and will do it

again. The man steps back, the makeup person begins to

add a moustache, and, by the end of the scene, Piccoli's

appearance is transformed. A gem!

Think of this movie as if you were at an exhibition of Vermeer

paintings. You move from painting to painting. Most of the

works are small, often just one or two persons are portrayed,

and the lighting and composition are perfect. Each painting

is a masterpiece, and together they create a brilliant exhibition.

This is "I'm Going Home."

If you want bright colors, action, large expanses of flesh,

multiple characters, and constant movement, find an

exhibition of paintings by Rubens. Perhaps equally enjoyable,

but not Vermeer, and not de Oliveira.

This is another low-key yet compelling latter-day offering from the indefatigable Portuguese film-maker; given that it deals with a famous but ageing actor (Michel Piccoli once again) who decides to give up his boots, it was probably meant as such by Oliveira himself – though he's still going strong seven years later, having not only made some half-a-dozen other films in the interim but, at nearly 100, has two more productions already lined up for 2009!

The plot starts off with Piccoli and his theater troupe (including a nice cameo by Catherine Deneuve) performing a Eugene Ionesco play about a mad king (with Piccoli being very funny at playing a doddering and dreamy fool), while later on they also put on Shakespeare's "The Tempest". Soon after the initial performance, however, Piccoli learns that his wife, daughter and son-in-law have all been killed in a traffic accident; this is a wonderfully directed sequence as the people who have come to inform Piccoli of the tragic events are forced to wait for the play to finish before intervening and, consequently, are seen pacing nervously backstage as the actors' voices boom in the distance spouting droll lines concerning the impending death of Piccoli's own character. As a result of the accident, the elderly actor is left with a young grandson solely in his care; though the two can't afford to spend a lot of time together – due to the nature of Piccoli's work and the boy's own schooling – they display genuine affection for each other.

The repetition of certain scenes – Piccoli watching the child leaving for school or going to a café (this, then, becomes a nice running gag involving another habitual client who likes to sit at the very same table as the protagonist) – may be a nod to Luis Bunuel's THE EXTERMINATING ANGEL (1962), meant as a reflection on the way one's life tends to become a series of routine chores. Having mentioned the Spanish surrealist master, as in Oliveira's later direct homage to him – BELLE TOUJOURS (2006), which I've just watched – the film has several bits showing Piccoli just walking around town; these don't merely serve to give us scenic views of the city, but also to crystallize Piccoli's bemused character: however, we're not spared the ugliness either, illustrated by the incident where one night he's held-up by a junkie and deprived of his beloved newly-purchased yellow shoes (which, in the preceding sequence, ostensibly depicting a conversation between Piccoli and his over-eager agent, had themselves amusingly been the 'protagonists')!

The second half of the picture involves the flow of TV and movie work which Piccoli's agent tries to set up for him: they immediately clash over an action-packed TV series (where the actor's asked to play a dupe for a much younger woman!), but does accept the proposal of a renowned American film director (John Malkovich, another past alumnus of Oliveria's) to take a small role in a new rendition of James Joyce's "Ulysses" – for the record, I own Joseph Strick's 1967 film adaptation myself but have yet to check it out. Still, their collaboration (Malkovich had initially felt privileged in obtaining the services of such a distinguished actor) isn't a felicitous one: Piccoli has difficulty in both remembering and fluently delivering the heavy-going English prose, while Malkovich proves an exacting director – insisting on a rigorous fidelity to Joyce's text. Tired of the whole set-up, Piccoli quits with the soft-spoken yet unequivocal interjection of "Je rentre a' la maison" (I'm going home), and staggers out onto the streets of Paris still 'in character' and period costume (baffling passers-by and the patrons at a pub no end); when Piccoli arrives at the house, he even ignores the grandson's presence in the yard and goes straight up to his room. Had this been Oliveira's last film, it would have been a wonderful tribute to the actor's profession and an insightful reflection on old age and approaching death but, as I said before, the ceaseless Portuguese director still had (indeed has) other aces up his sleeve