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Claude Chabrol, the legendary French New Wave director whose oeuvre spanned more than 60 movies, all infused with suspense and creepy tension, died earlier in 2010. First Run Features is now releasing a two-DVD set of Chabrol films, featuring two of his lesser-known late-career thrillers. Both are very good, both are worth seeing. It’s also a decent introduction to Chabrol for those who are not familiar with his work, as these are two fairly accessible movies compared to the rest of his output.
Merci Pour Le Chocolat (********8/10)
Year: 2000
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Countries: France, Switzerland
Language: French w/ English subtitles
Starring: Isabelle Huppert, Jacques Dutronc, Rodolphe Pauly, Anna Mougalis
Director: Claude Chabrol
Run time: 99 minutes
DVD distributor: First Run Features
Merci Pour Le Chocolat translates literally as “Thanks For The Chocolate”, but the screen shot that opens the film calls the movie Nightcap for English audiences. I like that title. Somehow, having seen the movie, the word “nightcap” holds more subtle menace than does “chocolate”.
There are a few story lines that make up Nightcap. One is about Jeanne (Anna Mougalis), an aspiring pianist, who discovers an old family secret. Although it is unlikely to be true, there is a slim chance that she was switched at birth with another baby. The other child was the son, Guillaume (Rodolphe Pauly) of world-famous concert pianist Andre Polonski (Jacques Dutronc). Jeanne plays piano, could her father be this incredible pianist?
Another story line involves the pianist himself and his new wife Mika (the wonderful Isabelle Huppert). They have a strange relationship, almost disinterested and passive-aggressive most of the time. Their seemingly happy family has a cloud hanging over it, stemming from the mysterious death several years earlier of Andre’s first wife (and Guillaume’s mother) Lisbeth.
Jeanne goes to visit Andre out of morbid curiosity, more than anything else. She doesn’t really believe he is her real father, but the coincidence is intriguing. On her first visit there, she catches Mika intentionally dropping a thermos full of chocolate. Jeanne later finds out that the chocolate in that thermos was spiked with Rohypnol, the date rape drug. And so begins the intrigue.
The whole film is tense in the way Hitchcock made his movies tense. We, the audience, know a little bit more than do most of the characters in the film. We suspect that Mika is a nefarious character, but we don’t really know how or why. We suspect that she is drugging people, but if she is, her motive for doing so is elusive and shrouded in mystery. It’s a terrific work. Not Chabrol’s best, but well worth revisiting. Here’s your chance to do so.
La Demoiselle d’Honneur (*******7/10)
Year: 2004
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Countries: France, Germany
Language: French w/ English subtitles
Starring: Benoit Magimel, Laura Smet, Aurore Clement
Director: Claude Chabrol
Run time: 110 minutes
DVD distributor: First Run Features
The Bridesmaid relies heavily on the performance of Laura Smet, who has to do two things. As Senta, the femme fatale title character, she must be so convincingly sexy that I believe her “victim”, Phillippe (Benoit Magimel), would fall head over heels for her, losing all perspective on what a relationship should be. At the same time, she has to be utterly crazy, and totally loony when it comes to what she believes a relationship is. It’s the only way the movie would work.
Basically, Chabrol asks us to buy into a relationship that makes little sense. A button down, hard working real estate man loses himself entirely when a strange beautiful woman throws herself at him. He loses himself so much, in fact, that if he were to discover that she was some kind of serial killer he would still be madly in love with her. That stretches credibility, on its surface.
But Laura Smet is so good, and so convincing, that I could actually see it. I know what a brand new relationship is like, the rush of new love and so forth. And I can see it being that much more intense with a woman who is, to borrow a phrase from John Mayer, sexual napalm. And I can see such intensity in Smet that she can’t help but transfer it to her unfortunate partner Phillippe.
As with most Chabrol works, there is more going on in this movie than a young man’s insane relationship with a deranged woman who may or may not be a killer. There is also the wedding of Phillippe’s younger sister. There is a lot made of the relationship his mother (the terrific Aurore Clement) has with a mysterious man named Gerard. And there is a creepy stone bust that comes into the movie at strange times, so Phillippe can sleep with it. Or kiss it.
But in the end, what stayed with me was Laura Smet. Her maniac obsession, her violent mood swings, her childlike vulnerability, and her magnetic sexuality. She is The Bridesmaid. Not just the character, but the whole movie.