Marie-Jo is a woman who lives a perfect and happy couple's life with his husband, Daniel, and his daughter Julie. Daniel has a small building company and Marie-Jo works as ambulance driver. But Marie-Jo also loves Marco, a pilot of Marseille's harbour. Equally loving the two men, Marie-Jo shall face a very difficult situation and she lives this double love as a curse in spite of happiness that she has with it. She particularly suffers to be lying to her husband and not be able to share his love for Marco with him. One day, she makes a choice and goes away from his house to live with Marco. But, she can't accept the distress she has herself given to her husband and, after some days, she returns home. Nevertheless, Marie-Jo will return once a time with Marco and that will be the cause of the final drama. During a sea excursion aboard their boat, Marco and Marie-Jo will die by drowning. Suicide or accident? The movie perhaps a little too long is valuable by the actors' performance in this tragic love story, the sensibility of the telling of this adultery situation, the well-painted ambiance of human relationship in this Marseille district called "L'Estaque" and the magnificent Renato Berta's cinematography.
11 Reviews
A Non-Original, Tragic and Moralist Story
claudio_carvalho19 October 2004
In Marseilles, Marie-Jo (Ariane Ascaride) is an unfaithful middle-age middle-class woman, who drives an ambulance and is married with the builder Daniel Jean-Pierre Darroussin). They have a teenager daughter Julie (Julie-Marie Parmentier), who is engaged of Sylvain (Yann Tregouët). Marie-Jo falls in love with the pilot Daniel (Gérard Meylan) and divides her love by her lover and her husband. This weird relationship ends in a tragic and moralist way. I have just watched the good movie 'La Ville Est Tranquille' and I have decided to see 'Marie-Jo et Ses 2 Amours' to know a little bit more about Robert Guédiguian. Inclusive both movies has the same cast. I found 'Marie-Jo et Ses 2 Amours' a non-original, tragic and moralist movie, but again with a great performance of the cast. The storyline is identical to Ingmar Bergman's 'Beröringen (1971)', with the difference that 'Beröringen' has an open end and is a great movie. 'Marie-Jo et Ses 2 Amours' is really a very disappointing film. My vote is six.
Title (Brazil): 'Marie-Jo e Seus Dois Amores' {'Marie-Jo and Her Two Loves')
Title (Brazil): 'Marie-Jo e Seus Dois Amores' {'Marie-Jo and Her Two Loves')
Ordinary but absorbing
Spod-38 May 2003
I found this film easy to watch (as might a lot of males given the amount of skin shown on the screen) because as well as the plot which is apparent from the title of the film, it gives a great feeling of what the ordinary parts of Marseille are like. It's like walking or driving around in the city. One of Marie-Jo's lovers is a builder, the other a ship pilot. We see what their lives entail, and how she complicates them. It's interesting to see a woman nearly 50 years old carrying off a sexually-charged role with such self-assuredness. One can't imagine this happening in a Hollywood movie like this. It also refuses to take a moral tone on what she is doing, and overall the action seems more matter-of-fact than melodramatic. Whether you see this as realistic or boring depends on your expectations of this sort of film. To me, it seemed realistic, at least for the French, and it more or less kept me guessing how or if things would be resolved, right up to the rather odd conclusion. I found this was the most unsatisfactory part of the film, mainly because it was hard to see why things happened the way they did, it almost looking like the ending was tacked on merely to put some sort of conclusion to the film. Overall I quite liked it, for showing that ordinariness can still be interesting, and that everyone has to decide on morality for themselves.
Gallic Symbols?
writers_reign29 November 2003
If Marie-Jo doesn't quite have it all she has a reasonable facsimile; happily married in her mid forties, still having great and regular six with her self-employed builder husband, for whom she does the accounts and who is as devoted to her as she is to him. A non-demanding job on the side ferrying patients to and from hospital appointments, a nice, well-appointed house, a gifted and bright daughter studying Law and herself in a stable and loving relationship. What more could she want? Well, nothing ... on paper. So why, given all these assets, can't she stop, after a 12 month clandestine affair, seeing Marco, a harbor pilot, who she loves as deeply as she does Daniel, her husband, and with whom she has equally great and equally regular sex. Welcome to the Marseilles of Marseilles-born Robert Guediguian, where nothing happens ... all at once. This guy has created and developed his own repertory company and, like that other great regional specialist Marcel Pagnol, returns again and again to his roots but not to flaunt the tourist side of Marseilles (as filmmakers are wont to do with Paris), merely to show the soft underbelly. His real-life partner Ariane Ascaride has never been more beguiling than she is here and the movie is punctuated by Ascaride smiles that light up the screen and, for the time you are watching, rival those of Hepburn (BOTH Hepburns actually) and Audrey (Amalie) Tatou. Once again she is more than ably supported by Guediguian stalwarts Jean-Pierre Darroussin (who may have it written into his contract that he gets to dance every time he goes to bat - catch him in 'Un air de famille' and you'll see what I mean) as Daniel and Gerard Meylan (the Marius of 'Marius et Jeanette') as Marco the pilot. Mid-life crises are not new, neither are mid-life affairs, but whereas the couple in 'Brief Encounter' were terribly well-behaved and kept a stiff-upper lip whilst enduring the torment of middle-aged longing, the French menage a trois here let it all hang out. The problem is that given the way Guediguian has elected to go with this story there's no real way to resolve it without upsetting some element of the audience.Brushing that aside this is a great movie, by turns lyrical, happy and heartbreaking. The three leads are outstanding but Neil Simon it isn't. Rating : Four and one half stars going away.
The triangle
bob99827 March 2006
Robert Guédiguian has created a world out of some parts of Marseille that I feel very comfortable in. His stock company of Ariane Ascaride, Gérard Meylan and Jean-Pierre Darroussin have made many films with him, and are at ease with his practices. If Darroussin's character is perhaps a little too eager to go along with his wife's infidelity, the richness of the narrative makes us pardon this flaw.
The film does have a very slow action which will make some viewers impatient. It takes a long time for Marie-Jo to leave Daniel and go off to Marco's house, and she has trouble at work (she drives disabled people to their doctor and back) that isn't fully examined. Ariane Ascaride's performance is fully equal to the demands made on her, and made me think more than once of Jeanne Moreau in Truffaut's masterpiece, a similar situation of a woman having to choose between two men and failing to do it.
The film does have a very slow action which will make some viewers impatient. It takes a long time for Marie-Jo to leave Daniel and go off to Marco's house, and she has trouble at work (she drives disabled people to their doctor and back) that isn't fully examined. Ariane Ascaride's performance is fully equal to the demands made on her, and made me think more than once of Jeanne Moreau in Truffaut's masterpiece, a similar situation of a woman having to choose between two men and failing to do it.
Marseilles in modified temper
stensson14 June 2003
How many films haven't you seen (especially French ones) about the married woman having an "affair"? There aren't many surprises here either, but the acting makes it believeable anyway. It's too much to say that this is like a documentary, it's far from it, but the realistic performances by Ariane Ascaride and Jean-Pierre Darroussin give real life to everything.
Marseilles plays a big part here. That city is almost like an actor. The emotional conditions for these people might have been different somewhere else. The tempo is slow however and so is the temper. You have time to breath, watching this.
Marseilles plays a big part here. That city is almost like an actor. The emotional conditions for these people might have been different somewhere else. The tempo is slow however and so is the temper. You have time to breath, watching this.
Very Long Story of Unexplained Character Motivations
3xHCCH11 June 2009
"Marie-Jo et Ses Deux Amours" is the story of exactly what the title says. A middle aged woman Marie-Jo, seemingly happily married to her kind-hearted husband Daniel with a smart teenage daughter Julie, is having a concurrent serious affair with another man Marco. OK, this melodrama is not my cup of tea to begin with, but I stayed on to find out what happens to this love triangle. For me, the whole movie is maddening because the director never really tells us why Marie Jo would sacrifice her family for this Marco guy. How Marie Jo and Marco met was merely glossed over. Whenever they meet they are probably naked in bed. The story telling is very slow, taking all of two hours. And this repetitive meandering leads to a very sudden and unsatisfying conclusion.
Is this really a Guédiguian movie?
davidcarbajales11 May 2003
Located in Marseille (as usual), a middle-age married woman falls in love with another man, not her husband. She decides going to live with her lover. Well, there is not problem at all at the moment, but why nobody explains what are the feelings of the woman, her doubts and stuff? She leaves the familiar house with no explanations, in the manner as she was doing an everyday thing. It's a continuous and ridiculous succession of lovers looking lovers through a window listening to songs like "What a wonderful world" when they make love. And the end, oh dear, the end is so preposterous that I feel very ashamed to tell it to nobody. Guédiguian, I still have faith in your movies ("Marius et Jeanette", ...) but don't frighten me like this never more.
Another cheerful tragedy from Robert Guediguian and the Collective
Philby-36 July 2003
More Marseilles melodrama in the usual ultra-realistic style, and with Marseilles itself as co-star. Trim, 40ish Marie-Jo (Ariane Ascaride) is happily married to doting builder husband Daniel (John-Pierre Daurossin) but she has also fallen in love with craggily handsome bachelor Marco (Gerard Meylan), a harbour pilot. She has a job transporting the sick which gives her plenty of opportunity for dalliance with the frequently idle Marco, until one day her daughter Julie (Julie-Marie Parmentier) spots her at his flat and realises what Mum's up to.
Despite the sunny locale we know things are not going to end well, but what happens is a bit of a surprise. Ariane Ascaride gives her character plenty of the required sexiness, middle aged though she may be, and John-Pierre Daurossin does a great line in dog-like devotion (even when he finds out). I thought the Marco character a little unsatisfactory what is he in this relationship for? Also I'm still trying to work out why the Marseilles-Corsica ferry, in and out of the harbour every day, still needs a pilot. (Maybe the pilots, though redundant, have a strong union. They certainly have a flash shore office). Anyhow Marie-Jo needs some emotional fulfilment outside her marriage, and he's it.
Robert Guediguian has a talent for bringing interest out of the ordinary and getting us to like his characters despite their flaws. He also mixes in the Marseilles atmosphere and manages to produce a cheerful tragedy, if that's possible. His use of the same actors in film after film gives a curious continuity to his work, despite the different roles a repertory of the cinema, in fact. Ordinary their subjects may be I still find his films absorbing and on occasion moving.
Despite the sunny locale we know things are not going to end well, but what happens is a bit of a surprise. Ariane Ascaride gives her character plenty of the required sexiness, middle aged though she may be, and John-Pierre Daurossin does a great line in dog-like devotion (even when he finds out). I thought the Marco character a little unsatisfactory what is he in this relationship for? Also I'm still trying to work out why the Marseilles-Corsica ferry, in and out of the harbour every day, still needs a pilot. (Maybe the pilots, though redundant, have a strong union. They certainly have a flash shore office). Anyhow Marie-Jo needs some emotional fulfilment outside her marriage, and he's it.
Robert Guediguian has a talent for bringing interest out of the ordinary and getting us to like his characters despite their flaws. He also mixes in the Marseilles atmosphere and manages to produce a cheerful tragedy, if that's possible. His use of the same actors in film after film gives a curious continuity to his work, despite the different roles a repertory of the cinema, in fact. Ordinary their subjects may be I still find his films absorbing and on occasion moving.
Ariane embraced
Cristi_Ciopron25 February 2010
Warning: Spoilers
The scene in this movie where Ariane Ascaride's lover kisses her naked body, the naked body of this 47 yrs broad, while she is asleep might be one of the most erotic takes ever, and it's a very lovely thing to show; it reminded me of scenes from a drama with Hopper and Ms Amy Irving—but that was in a wholly different register. I also thought about the fact that a director who apparently deserved such a scene, the Italian Brass, never achieved one.
And it is one of those instances when the cinema succeeds in recreating the casualness and naturalness of a slice of life, or a bit of reality, that is meaningful to me.
Otherwise, Ariane is one of the actresses I'm very interested in; I find her very sexy, and she looks like a nice and decent woman. I am glad it was her in that casual, nice, warm bed scene of secret tenderness.
And it is one of those instances when the cinema succeeds in recreating the casualness and naturalness of a slice of life, or a bit of reality, that is meaningful to me.
Otherwise, Ariane is one of the actresses I'm very interested in; I find her very sexy, and she looks like a nice and decent woman. I am glad it was her in that casual, nice, warm bed scene of secret tenderness.
Claude Sautet's legacy
searchanddestroy-112 January 2023
When I watch this film, and some others from Robert Guediguian's team, crew: Jean-PierreDarroussin, Ariana Ascaride, Gerad Meylan, I can't prevent myself to think about Romy Schneider, Michel Piccoli, Yves Montand,....and Claude Sautet's films. More than Marcel Pagnol's style for sure, despite the South of France's settings. The magic way those two directors (Sautet and Guediguian) have to describe those characters relationship in bitter but so beautiful, poignant, moving dramas. It is so simple, brilliant, intelligent, because most of audiences can recognize themselves in those portraits. So human, so sensitive. The technicalities in term of pure directing are of course a bit different. And Marseilles is also a character in most of Robert Guédiguian's films. Pure delight despite the bitter taste in the mouth after watching. Don't confound with François Truffaut's JULES ET JIM, because of the scheme of a woman in love with two men. Or Oliver Stone's SAVAGES.
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