Xavier Gianolli's breakthrough film may at first glance to seem like, ho-hum, another period costume drama. But that's before you realize that the source is Honoré de Balzac (as with his hero here, the aristocratic "de" was self-attributed), the merciless dissector of society's corruption and malice.
The period in question (one that isn't often seen in films or novels) is that of France under the post-Napoleonic Restoration of the monarchy, likely during the reign of Louis XVIII, who allowed a measure of post-revolutionary freedoms to persist until pressure from the ultra-royalist faction became irresistible and led to a crackdown. Physical details and social relations are, as far as I can tell, depicted with rigorous fidelity, including in the musical background, drawn from that period and from the preceding century - Vivaldi and Rameau to Mozart and Schubert.
The story line, based faithfully on one of Balzac's greatest works, follows a well-trodden path: provincial boy dreams of turning his good looks and his modest gifts as (in this case) a poet into a life of love, fame and fortune. External forces conspire bring him to Paris, where he plunges into a snakes-and-ladders ascension, casting aside caution and ever more scruples until his presumption (both social and artistic) is, inevitably and crushingly, exposed. (Coincidentally, the Metropolitan Opera has just ended a brief run of Stravinsky's marvelous opera "The Rake's Progress", whose basic plot line, taken from what today we would call a graphic novel of the same name by the XVIIIth century engraver William Hogarth, tracks eerily with Balzac's - but of course with so many others' as well.)
The film is dazzlingly well acted by everyone involved, starting with the handsome Benjamin Voisin as Lucien Chardon, a callow pharmacist's son (who assumes the name Lucien de Rubempré, thus signalling his pretension to an aristocratic background that the real aristocrats quickly catch on to and do not forgive), whom others play like a violin to achieve their own, usually foul, aims. His sudden transformation from innocent, awkward, likeable provincial into an absurd fop is stunning to behold. His moral innocence is washed away just as quickly, but he is never clever nor evil-minded enough to keep up with those with power and far greater experience who, for an array of reasons, pull puppet strings to ensure his destruction.
Paris, both among bohemian (but always cynical) littérateurs and unscrupulous journalists and publishers (with a scenery-eating cameo by Gérard Depardieu as a successful publisher who can neither read nor write but who has an unfailing sense of what will sell), is shown to be a machine for crushing innocence, ambition, and talent - a place where all that matters is your connections, your ability to please, and your willingness to achieve your ends by whatever means. Prostitution is universal, and everyone, not just the city's many overt sex workers, is prostituted in one way or another.
It's a wonderfully gifted cast, including the particularly wonderful Cécile de France as the aristocratic deus ex machina whose lust for Lucien sets the plot in motion; the earthy Salomé Dewaels as Lucien's true love (she will surely be going places after this); and a host of journeymen and women from the deep well of French acting talent. All take their roles with gusto and real depth. Every face, even in crowd scenes, is expressive, every nuance (so important amid such highly codified social constructs) is pitch perfect.
Jeanne Balibar as the Marquise d'Espar is the terrifying arbiter of all the nuances and proprieties by which everyone else is assessed as belonging to proper Society, or, in most cases, not. And special notice must be taken of a stunningly understated performance by the young Canadian wunderkind actor and director Xavier Dolan, not until now known for understatement. Yet here he is, a darkly recessive, chillingly alert and watchful presence -- and, boy, does he nail his role as the agent of Lucien's nemesis. Kudos also to Vincent Lacoste, until now only seen in unambitious soap operas and telefilms, who does a wonderfully engaging turn as the Lucien's hash-smoking mentor, initiating him into the dark arts of journalistic prostitution, revealing to him the ease with which, if one is only willing to be unscrupulous and clever enough, one can use the dark arts of fake news to casually destroy lives and careers while gaining wealth.
Beautifully filmed, perfectly paced, this takes the best of the Jane Austin films, for example, and gives them a Gallic (and so, of course, cynical) twist. Balzac's is a world of endless fake news and mindless ambition, in which there are no happy endings, and in which the tragedies of others are merely the subject of tight self-satisfied smiles. Jane's world, in which an ambitious young woman can in the end become the master of at least part of her fate, is far away. This one is a lot closer to ours, and this film might just be "La Règle du jeu" for our times.
PS on accents: For perhaps understandable reasons, the historical verisimilitude is cast aside when it comes to speech. Thus not only does Xavier Dolan completely drop his Québecois accent (so pronounced in his own films), but he and everyone speaks the French equivalent of the King's English -- in this case perfect, modern Parisian. I must go back and see if Balzac says anything on the subject, but Lucien is from the Charentes, in southwesstern France, and would have arrived in Paris with a very pronounced accent which would instantly have exposed him as a provincial (to the literary world) and a commoner (to the aristocratic one). Understandably, the film doesn't go there, but it's worth reflecting on why.
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