拜拜笨蛋

Juxtaposing his endeavor both in front of and behind the camera, French triple-threat Albert Dupontel (actor, screenwriter and director) has steadfastly established himself as a prominent practitioner in the French cinema, his two recent films, SEE YOU UP THERE (2017) and BYE BYE MORONS (2020), his sixth and seventh feature, are both multiple recipients of the César Awards. SEE YOU UP THERE is a phantasmagoric adaptation of Pierre Lemaitre’s Prix Goncourt winning novel “The Great Swindle”, the story mostly takes place during the interwar period. Albert Maillard (Dupontel) and Edouard Péricourt (Pérez Biscayart) both survive WWI on the frontline but at great cost, the former loses his job, his girlfriend and the latter his jaw and his entire identity, while the evil Lieutenant Pradelle (Lafitte, who steals every and each single scene with a delectable vileness and still vibes a soupçon of dangerous charisma that both terrorizes and fascinates us), the scourge of their loss, lines his pocket with the dodgy cemetery business, and manages to marry Edouard’s sister Madeleine (Dequenne). A disfigured Edouard hides himself behind the exquisite masks he fashions (which include pastiches of Picasso and Duchamp and a final stunner of a feathery blue bird, a homage to Judex for shizzle!) and is presumed dead insofar as the rest of the world is concerned. Together with Albert and Louise (Balster), a young girl who acts as a magical translator of his inarticulate utterance, Edouard covertly devises a monumental scam to exact revenge on the unjust world, personified by his father Marcel (Arestrup, magisterially typecast as a dour paterfamilias), a filthy rich banker. SEE YOU UP THERE is, more than anything, a reverberant slap on the face of militarism, warmongering and the patriarchal Establishment. Edouard wastes all his life rebelling against his distant, uncaring father, the fount of all his suffering and misery, all mounts to a reunion that culminates with a tearful Marcel finally embracing his long-lost son, a sentimentally powerful moment, only to be trounced by Edouard’s final leap of rebellion, a beatific farewell and a thoroughgoing rebuff to that belated paternal remorse and elation, Marcel doesn’t deserve salvation and Edouard utilizes himself as a final blow to ascertain that doesn’t happen. Plus, by arranging Albert as the film’s narrator and POV, the film evokes a strong Proustian sensibility in its seriocomic vein.

BYE BYE MORONS is an original story concocted by Dupontel and co., in which he imagineers a screwball-y comedy about desperate outsiders of the modern society. Suze Trappet (Efira) is a hairdresser whose days are numbered due to a terminal disease, so her exigent mission is to locate the son she was press-ganged to give up when she was merely a teenager. Jean-Baptiste Cuchas (Dupontel) is a senior technology geek who gets the short stick in the company and becomes world-weary. After his suicidal plan goes awry, he, Suze and Serge Blin (Marié), a blind archivist, embarks on an adventure to fulfill Suze’s wish. Unlike the earthy, muted palette of “les années folles”, superlatively rendered in SEE YOU UP THERE, here Dupontel the director wields his wand and creates an over-saturated microcosm that is perpetually bathed in orange light and a slightly futuristic touch. The film, according to Dupontel, is a tribute to the Monty Python troupe, in particular, to Terry Jones, who passed away in 2020, and his fellow Python member Terry Gilliam also contributes to a funny cameo as a hunter in a commercial. But, the Pythons anarchic humor is lost in translation on the Gallic soil, what Dupontel and his co-scribes contrive to hammer out is a familiar trajectory of dissecting the society’s malaise (although the flak leveling at the corporate impersonality is too mild to pack a punch), but in a most digestible, predictable fashion. All the elements are threadbare (Suze pouring her heart out to encourage her son to be brave and to profess his love for the girl he carries a torch for, a miraculous recollection of an old man smitten by dementia, Blin’s heroic act as a diversion and inexplicably, a helping hand, etc.) and the collective impact is all but underwhelming, which leaves the defiant finale, a Thelma and Louise moment, somehow like a non sequitur, as if the filmmaker is self-conscious of reaching a preordained finishing line, compounded by the close-ups of a random gun during the scrappy climax. Without a strong textual support, the film’s appeal peters out significantly. Therefore, it is quite bizarre that it is BYE BYE MORONS, not the more well-crafted SEE YOU UP THERE, which runs rings around the former almost in every regard, that nabs the top honor in the César Awards, both films win Dupontel Best Director trophies though. It is undeniable that Dupontel proves himself as a rather expert tastemaker in designing and applying striking aesthetics to his works, the long take following a messenger dog in the trench at the beginning of SEE YOU UP THERE alone shows him is really good at his métier. But the over-exposed sheen in BYE BYE MORONS looks awfully artificial in comparison with the majestic period setting and elegant details manufactured in SEE YOU UP THERE. referential entries: Xavier Giannoli’s LOST ILLUSIONS (2021, 7.5/10); Nicolas Bedos’s LA BELLE ÉPOQUE (2019, 6.7/10).

English Title: See You Up ThereOriginal Title: Au revoir là-hautYear: 2017Genre: Drama, Comedy, WarCountry: France, CanadaLanguage: French, GermanDirector/Screenwriter: Albert Dupontelbased on the book by Pierre LemaitreMusic: Christophe JulienCinematography: Vincent MathiasEditor: Christophe PinelCast:Albert DupontelNahuel Pérez BiscayartLaurent LafitteNiels ArestrupHéloïse BalsterÉmile DequenneMélanie ThierryPhilippe UchanAndré MarconKyan KhojandiMichel VuillermozRating: 7.7/10English Title: Bye Bye MoronsOriginal Title: Adieu les consYear: 2020Genre: Comedy, DramaCountry: FranceLanguage: French, EnglishDirector: Albert DupontelScreenwriters: Albert Dupontel, Marcia Romano, Xavier NemoMusic: Christophe JulienCinematography: Alexis KavyrchineEditor: Christophe PinelCast:Virginie EfiraAlbert DupontelNicolas MariéJackie BerroyerPhilippe UchanBastien UghettoMarilou AussillouxMichel VuillermozLaurent StockerCatherine DavenierBouli LannersJoséphine HélinTerry GilliamRating: 6.6/10