FLICKS- Roman De Gare Roman de Gare is a bright little concoction that will tickle your brain while leaving a satisfying aftertaste.
by Chris Dashiell- The Film Snob
The perfect crime. That's the Holy Grail of the mystery writer. And that's the theme of Roman de Gare, a new film by French writer-director Claude Lelouch. "Roman de gare" is actually slang for cheap novel, or airport novel, one of those mass market page turners that appear regularly on the best-seller lists. The film inhabits that genre, and that world, constructing an intricate puzzle that ends up challenging our obsession with plot.
In overlapping sequences, we meet several characters, but the identities and relationships are elusive. The narrative begins with Fanny Ardant playing a popular mystery writer named Judith Ralitzer, who is apparently being questioned about the disappearance of an associate. Her story involves the origins of her latest and popular novel. We are then made aware that a serial killer is on the loose who uses magic tricks to lull his victims into a false sense of security. Cut to a traveling couple quarreling in their car. The young woman, a hairdresser names Huguette played by Audrey Dana, is abandoned at a gas station by her angry fiancé. There she meets a strange little man who does magic tricks and offers to give her a ride. Eventually, when the fiancé doesn't return, she accepts. At some point he charms her by saying that he's Judith Ralitzer's ghost writer, but later claims he's actually a teacher who's run away from his job and his wife. Or is he the serial killer? Lelouche draws us along like a mystery writer with false leads. Huguette asks the man if he could pretend to be her fiancé when she visits her rural family in the Alps. He agrees, and the film's maze-like twists and turns become more humorous.
We get to know the stranger better. His name is Pierre Laclos, and he's played by Dominique Pinon, a gnome-like character actor who for once gets to be at the center of a movie. He's a compelling presence, and his performance is full of wit and nuance. The identities and relationships become clearer eventually, but then there are further puzzles. The clever motif of the magic tricks actually reflects the director's method. The style of the film is like a trick that deliberately calls attention to its own manipulation, and it gradually sinks in that the story we're watching is also the story that's being written. And just as in the sensational books that it's modeled on, the solution to the film's mystery turns out to be both ingenious and improbable. As entrancing as the intricacies of plot may be, Lelouch seems to be saying, the real story lies in human relationships, in this case between Pierre and the forlorn hairdresser.
Roman de Gare is a bright little concoction that will tickle your brain while leaving a satisfying aftertaste.
Chris (the Film Snob) produces the weekly mini-program "Flicks" exclusively for 91.3FM KXCI. Tune in Mondays at 8:00PM and Fridays at 10:00AM and 3:00PM. For more writings from the Film Snob visit www.cinecene.com
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