Peau d’homme, coeur de bête
France,
1999, 97 min
Shown in 2000
CREDITS
- dir
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Hélène Angel
- prod
-
Hélène Cases
- scr
-
Hélène Angel
- cam
-
Isabelle Razavet
- editor
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Laurent Rouan, Eric Renault
- cast
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Serge Riaboukine, Bernard Blancan, Pascal Cervo, Maaïke Jansen, Guilaine Londez, Jean-Louis Richard
- prod co
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Why Not Productions; Arte France Cinema; Canal +
- source
-
Celluloid Dreams, 24, rue Lamartine, 75009 Paris, France. FAX: 33-1-49-70-85-62. EMAIL: celluloid@i-t.FR
-
COMMENTS
Skyy Prize contender.
OTHER
Dark family secrets are the stuff of French cinema, underlying its pervasive rural moodiness. A new generation of filmmakers is prying open that taciturn tradition to tell it like it is, making even Chabrol look closed-mouthed about family violence. In Hélène Angel’s stark and stunning debut feature, set amid the rocky terrain of southern France, a family—or a family’s idea of itself—is shattered by the return of a prodigal son after 15 years. No one particularly buys Coco’s (Bernard Blancan) story of having joined the French Foreign Legion—Jean Gabin, he’s not. But what he is—feral or naive, kindly or killer—is a mystery. Angel allows the mystery to fester in the background while Coco’s brothers variously act on the whims of their bestial hearts, from the out-of-control womanizer Frankie (Serge Riaboukine) to young Alex (Pascal Cervo), errand boy to local mobsters. Behind the beery sentimentalism of provincial life is a reality of prostitution rings and sleazy fairgrounds. Then everyone goes home to maman. Two young girls, Frankie’s daughters, stand in for Angel, who said, “Events shaped me, but I had no control over them. To make films is to catch that distant, primitive time.”
—Judy Bloch
FACTOID #75
Italian screen siren and ’60s sex symbol Sophia Loren appeared in two films screened at the San Francisco International Film Festival: Ettore Scola’s A Special Day in 1977 and Francesco Rosi’s More Than a Miracle in 1981.
