L’Ennui
France,
1998, 120 min
Shown in 1999
CREDITS
- dir
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Cédric Kahn
- prod
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Paulo Branco
- scr
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Cédric Kahn, Laurence Ferreira Barbosa, Gilles Taurand
- cam
-
Pascal Marti
- editor
-
Yann Dedet
- cast
-
Charles Berling, Sophie Guillemin, Arielle Dombasle, Robert Kramer
- source
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Gemini Films, 73, rue Saint Denis, 75001 Paris, fronce. FAX: 33-1-4233-1213
-
COMMENTS
Cédric Kahn and Charles Berling in person.
OTHER
Breakout director Cédric Kahn’s third film, loosely based on Alberto Moravia’s La Noia, won him the much-coveted Prix Louis Delluc for best French film of 1998. By choosing to work—originally and convincingly—from a modern classic, Kahn dares to violate the taboo that one is an auteur only by writing original screenplays. In fact, Ennui has the quick pace and sense of modern life of Kahn’s earlier Too Much Happiness (SFIFF 1995) and Bar des Rails. Martin, a philosophy teacher, has separated from his wife and is attracted to a very young and zaftig girl who could have been a model for Maillol or Renoir. But Cecilia (exceptional newcomer Sophie Guillemin), with her wide eyes and faint smile, offers an absolute resistance to Martin’s relentless questioning about her life—and especially her love life. The conflict between the man’s will to know and the woman’s blank matter-of-factness is a source of high comedy, while the love scenes have an unusual physical frankness. Charles Berling (Ridicule) has a frantic acting style which conveys his character’s impatience and his opposition to Cecilia—Culture vs. Nature, so to speak—and offers a sardonic look at the old emblematic representation of the sexes.
—Michel Ciment
FACTOID #81
Anjelica Huston was the first recipient of the Piper-Heidsieck Award in 1991. When Huston received the prize from the champagne maker, she joked, “Can I drink it?”
