Marius et Jeannette (1997)
Country: FR
Technical: col/1.66:1 105m
Director: Robert Guédiguian
Cast: Ariane Ascaride, Gérard Meylan, Jean-Pierre Darroussin
Synopsis:
A security guard and a widowed mother of two pursue a tentative courtship in one of the poorer quarters of Marseilles. Their neighbours take an interest in their eventual happiness together.
Review:
Guédiguian's cinema is very much a 'cinéma engagé' of working class characters who talk about themselves and their concerns with the mixture of humour and political conscience typical of the films of Ken Loach. There is an unavoidable whiff of Pagnol, too, in the mocking and at times rumbustious antics of these people, who undoubtedly have a lot of affection for each other but give no quarter when it comes to telling home truths. The director gets close to his subjects, letting the camera rest on their faces long enough for us contemplate their humanity; even the belligerent supermarket manager responsible for firing Jeannette is later let into the fold of tolerated, even valued, acquaintances by the close community of neighbours who share her courtyard, and whose love lives are revigorated by the budding affair in their midst. A gentle, undramatic film, which echoes the lives of these workers themselves so short on incident, and in which the preparation of an aïoli for a communal meal acquires a special importance. Only once does the tone waver, in a Fordian barroom brawl where they suffer nary a scratch.
Country: FR
Technical: col/1.66:1 105m
Director: Robert Guédiguian
Cast: Ariane Ascaride, Gérard Meylan, Jean-Pierre Darroussin
Synopsis:
A security guard and a widowed mother of two pursue a tentative courtship in one of the poorer quarters of Marseilles. Their neighbours take an interest in their eventual happiness together.
Review:
Guédiguian's cinema is very much a 'cinéma engagé' of working class characters who talk about themselves and their concerns with the mixture of humour and political conscience typical of the films of Ken Loach. There is an unavoidable whiff of Pagnol, too, in the mocking and at times rumbustious antics of these people, who undoubtedly have a lot of affection for each other but give no quarter when it comes to telling home truths. The director gets close to his subjects, letting the camera rest on their faces long enough for us contemplate their humanity; even the belligerent supermarket manager responsible for firing Jeannette is later let into the fold of tolerated, even valued, acquaintances by the close community of neighbours who share her courtyard, and whose love lives are revigorated by the budding affair in their midst. A gentle, undramatic film, which echoes the lives of these workers themselves so short on incident, and in which the preparation of an aïoli for a communal meal acquires a special importance. Only once does the tone waver, in a Fordian barroom brawl where they suffer nary a scratch.
Country: FR
Technical: col/1.66:1 105m
Director: Robert Guédiguian
Cast: Ariane Ascaride, Gérard Meylan, Jean-Pierre Darroussin
Synopsis:
A security guard and a widowed mother of two pursue a tentative courtship in one of the poorer quarters of Marseilles. Their neighbours take an interest in their eventual happiness together.
Review:
Guédiguian's cinema is very much a 'cinéma engagé' of working class characters who talk about themselves and their concerns with the mixture of humour and political conscience typical of the films of Ken Loach. There is an unavoidable whiff of Pagnol, too, in the mocking and at times rumbustious antics of these people, who undoubtedly have a lot of affection for each other but give no quarter when it comes to telling home truths. The director gets close to his subjects, letting the camera rest on their faces long enough for us contemplate their humanity; even the belligerent supermarket manager responsible for firing Jeannette is later let into the fold of tolerated, even valued, acquaintances by the close community of neighbours who share her courtyard, and whose love lives are revigorated by the budding affair in their midst. A gentle, undramatic film, which echoes the lives of these workers themselves so short on incident, and in which the preparation of an aïoli for a communal meal acquires a special importance. Only once does the tone waver, in a Fordian barroom brawl where they suffer nary a scratch.