Review also posted at Nextbook
Deux Vies…Plus Une is a whimsical look at boredom and uncertainty around forty. The film’s New York Premiere is part of the Jewish Film Festival at the Film Society of Lincoln Center. Idit Cebula’s feature debut is engrossed with the newly turbulent life of Eliane Weiss, played by Emmanuelle Devos. She has an attentive husband, a precocious teenage daughter, a job teaching pre-school, and an overly supportive/nosy family. We sort of already know where all this is heading. Interminable happy panoramas do not a movie make…
In no time Eliane is falling flat on her face after tripping up the stairs to her flat. This is one of many literal breaking, or rather falling, points in the film. Soon thereafter, all the familiar starts to grow oppressive. The husband becomes controlling, the daughter starts to rebel (but this seems more to get her parent’s often diverted attention), and the family turns into a nuisance. Nonetheless, conflict is a wellspring of great art. Propelled by her desire for something new, Eliane decides to finally consolidate the notebook collages she has been creating over the years. A new computer gives her purpose, and an overactive imagination gives her stories. Talking to her dead father on a regular basis is one source of inspiration, and a handsome, independent publisher slowly becomes another. The intentions of this rakish blond, David Klein, are never illuminated, but Eliane’s husband, Sylvain, perceives him as a competitor worthy of histrionic chest-beating and a dollop of self-pity.
Sylvain is a pragmatist. He sells kitchens, forages for food around the apartment, and persists with an untroubled veneer of easy charm. He is at first uninterested in Eliane’s new hobby, and then offers conditional support as the possibility of publication looms. However he is a family man first and as soon as the outside, corrupting influences enter their once placid domicile, he is apoplectic.
Gérard Dorman, who plays the husband is a subtle presence. The camera is drawn to his fierce eyes and gesticulating arms, but the story is truly about Eliane’s passage through a second childhood. Devos’s performance is infectious. A regular in the films of Arnaud Desplechin, her character here flits from morose to blithe to mischievous and back again. This is heavy lifting for the actress and the audience, but we follow without protest, for the journey is so revelatory. The film is about all the little things we take for granted like a hug from a child, the obligatory check in call from a parent, and the partner who shares our pillow at night.
The buoyant score by Arthur Higelin is Eliane’s unspoken accomplice as she traipses through the city on her bike. The upbeat, punctilious chords suggest freedom and curiosity. This small film and its big actress share the same flamboyant spirit with the iconic characters created by Mary Tyler Moore and Valerie Harper in the 1970’s—women blazing their own mercurial path, societal pressure be damned!
At this point, you might be wondering why Deux Vies…Plus Une is playing at the Jewish Film Festival. We have a husband who wears pajamas to bed emblazoned with the Star of David and the Israeli flag. An octogenarian mother mispronounces French words for comic effect. The close knit family is depicted as wary of outsiders, especially handsome young German publishers. However, these ethnic touches don’t detract from the universal nature of the story. In fact we all can see a little bit of our own families as we are shuffled around the bustling dinner table.
The writer-director also inserts herself into the narrative as a successful author and mentor for Eliane. In fact it is her recommendation that leads to the publisher and possible extra-marital temptation. Cebula identifies with the pressures Eliane must endure. As a mother, a wife and a daughter she is just looking for a little piece of herself before there is nothing left. During a Q&A after the screening, the director alluded to this bond she shares with the protagonist. As a female artist there is a constant search to define a space in which to be creative. However this need can unsettle the traditional hierarchies and leave one rootless. By the end of the film, it is still unclear whether Eliane has mastered the collage of her own life, but she has undoubtedly gained confidence from the foray into the unknown.
Filed under: Uncategorized
