The sound of broken dreams hitting the ground: Happiness (Todd Solondz, 1998)

Lenny et Mona Jordan (Ben Gazzara et Louise Lasser) ont trois filles.

Joy Jordan (Jane Adams) est une aspirante chanteuse folk en perpétuel devenir et vivant toujours (faute de succès) chez ses parents. Son incurable idéalisme l'empêche de se caser (la scène d'ouverture du film correspond d'ailleurs à un énième rendez-vous se terminant en désastre) et l'incite à lâcher son boulot bêtement alimentaire de téléopératrice pour une mission plus noble: rejoindre une association donnant des cours d'anglais à des immigrés.

Trish Mapplewood, née Jordan (Cynthia Stevenson) répète à l'envi qu'elle a "tout" (comprendre: mari, enfants, maison, voiture), et notamment à ses sœurs, comme pour mieux les convaincre (et se convaincre elle-même) de sa réussite éclatante. Mais en réalité son mari Bill (Dylan Baker), un psychothérapeute lisse et froid, lui échappe de plus en plus sans qu'elle ait conscience qu'il lui dissimule un problème bien plus grave qu'une simple baisse de libido.

Helen Jordan (Lara Flynn Boyle) est une poétesse célébrée pour son œuvre sulfureuse, bâtie sur les prétendus sévices dont elle aurait été victime pendant son enfance. Jouissant perversement de l'aura trouble que lui confère cette supercherie, elle en profite pour mener une vie mondaine (et sexuelle) débridée. De loin l'observe Allen (le très regretté Philip Seymour Hoffman), un voisin enrobé et inhibé qui assouvit ses fantasmes de domination par le biais d'appels téléphoniques anonymes à des femmes choisies au hasard de l'annuaire. A tout prendre, il aurait peut-être davantage de chances de bâtir une relation avec Kristina (Camryn Manheim), une autre de ses voisines, vieille fille au physique ingrat mais qui semble réellement se soucier de lui alors que la belle Helen ignore même qu'il existe.

Happiness est, je ne pense rien apprendre à personne, un film bâti sur l'ironie: voilà une galerie de personnages (non exhaustive, mais l'aurais-je été que je courais le risque de devenir incompréhensible) qui, tous sans exception, courent après quelque chose qui symbolise pour eux l'arrivée à l'état de bonheur, l'accomplissement ultime. Chacun attribue cette propriété magique à un objectif différent, chacun croit savoir quels sont les obstacles et pourquoi il/elle arrivera (ou pas) à les franchir. Ou, dans le cas de Trish, croient tenir fermement tous les attributs du bonheur et n'avoir plus à le remettre en question. Et tous se trompent - sur ce qui devrait les rendre heureux un jour (peut-être), sur ce qui les rend si insatisfaits en comparaison dans le présent, sur les moyens de parvenir au bonheur, sur les obstacles qui les en séparent encore. 

Solondz ne nous épargne la description d'aucune de ces erreurs  - ce qui fait que le film semble, par moment, insupportablement cruel envers ses personnages, au point d'en être quasiment inregardable. Mais il ne faut pas s'y tromper pour autant, la véritable cible de Solondz n'est pas la faiblesse humaine - il nous démontre clairement que soit personne n'est totalement un monstre, soit nous sommes tous monstrueux d'une manière ou d'une autre. Ce qu'il épingle, c'est le désir de "normalité" maladif instillé par nos sociétés modernes (et son double inversé, le désir de se singulariser) qui nous change en bestioles hystériques et pitoyables.

I'm gonna dance the dream and make the dream come true: The red shoes (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1948)

La version française de cet article est disponible ici.

Boris Lermontov (Anton Walbrook) is world-class ballet director and he fits the bill: he is as demanding, secretive and aloof as one could imagine. Only dance has the ability to stir something in him that could pass for the burning passion of a living man - and then again, this passion would be of a mystic nature rather than a carnal one since he lives very much like a monk in his faith. He encounters two talented young people: the aspiring composer Julian Craster (Marius Goring), whose plagiarized work earned him some fame, and the incandescent ballerina Victoria Page (Moira Shearer). Capitalizing on their ambitions - simmering just below the deceptively innocent surface of their inexperience -, Lermontov is offering them both the opportunity of a lifetime. In his upcoming ballet based on Hans Christian Andersen's The red shoes (a tale about a vain girl lusting after a pair of enchanted shoes that will ultimately make her dance to death), Craster will compose the score and Page will be given the leading role.

From its opening night the ballet is, quite predictably, a success, and makes Vicky an overnight sensation. Lermontov makes a deal with her: provided she relies on him and commits to her dancing, he will help her become the greatest dancer the world has ever seen. Vicky, who is only too flattered to have attracted the attention of such a great man, accepts promptly... and in doing so, overlooks Lermontov's well-know aversion for any form of sentimental involvement in his proteges' lives. Indeed, according to Lermontov's point of view, the true artist should not have room in their soul for both art and earthly affections. Soon enough, Vicky falls in love and to make things even worse, she doesn't fall for Lermontov - she falls for Craster.

Perhaps my absolute indifference to ballet is responsible (at least partly) for the fact that I don't like The red shoes that much compared to other movies of Powell & Pressburger. In the whole primary school I was the only little girl who did not take ballet classes (some black sheep I was, even back then!). That being said, The tales of Hoffmann appealed even less to me since it is all about the ballet numbers. Maybe my lack of fondness has more to do with the fact that I can't relate to the story or to the characters as much as in other films such as The life and death of Colonel Blimp, I know where I'm going! or Black narcissus. Also, I'm not seduced by the somewhat grandiloquent baroque aesthetics of the film. Unlike Martin Scorsese or Bertrand Tavernier (who both fought to have Michael Powell acknowledged by movie scholars like the great director that he is, in spite of the infamously dismissive judgment made by none other than François Truffaut: see Michael Powell's memoirs, A life in movies and Million dollar movie), I'm most definitely not in awe of this film. However, I must admit that repeated viewings throughout the years have helped me distinguish more nuances and exquisite details in the overwhelming whirlpool of sounds and bright colors that is The red shoes. Little by little, I have come to appreciate it more than I initially did, and I have found a couple of elements I really love.

For starters, I find a lot of pleasure in watching the story unravel so smoothly, with the tale of The red shoes and Vicky's destiny so intimately interwoven that they outline the same pattern: that of a girl who would stop at nothing to dance, whatever the cost. Through subtle changes in camera angles and lighting, Powell suggests that the ballerina herself believes that she's under some spell. Couldn't Lermontov be the real-life match of the evil shoemaker of the ballet, since he is the one who ties the red ribbons around Vicky's ankles and thereby triggers the events that will eventually cause the young woman's demise? In many instances, the hold Lermontov has over Vicky is conveyed though the use of shots/countershots where her child-like face and delicate china doll complexion enhance her apparent vulnerability to the intense gaze, comforting hands and magnetic physical presence of her mentor.

One could muse on the shots that were chosen to introduce Lermontov to us: in a crowded theater just before the ballet starts, a pair of hands emerges from behind the velvet curtains of a private box, eliciting a wave of whispers from the aisles. One could, and wonder whether this movie has been an inspiration to Brian De Palma for shooting one of the opening scenes of Phantom of the Paradise, when Swan is first shown to us in a very similar way. In any case, it is obvious that the motif of the artist deprived of his work run through both films, and that both characters are crossovers between Faust, Dorian Gray and Pygmalion. In both instances, the character's personal grooming style is half-dandy, half-vampire. Walbrook's character is shown sporting gorgeous dressing gowns made of silk or velvet and on the rare occasions he is seen outdoors, his supernatural appearance is enhanced by the contrast between his extremely pale skin and the sunglasses he is wearing. Incidentally, Lermontov is also the name of a Russian poet whose most celebrated work, The demon, is about... well, a demon, who falls in love with a girl and takes her away from her fiance.

Another interpretation could be made of this story - I can't recall whether Powell mentioned this in his autobiography and I doubt that he did, most likely it's just me stretching things too far... But what if Lermontov was really the reflection of the tyrannical director Powell once was, and Vicky the incarnation of those (actresses, technicians) he self-admittedly abused, professionally or emotionally? Maybe I'm off tracks here but Powell acknowledged that he used to be too uncompromising, especially when he was trying to balance his budding career and his love affair with actress Deborah Kerr. And perhaps there is a little of Powell in Craster too, since the young composer follows his own way, convinced as he is that Vicky will eventually give up dancing to be with him?

My second epiphany comes from Anton Walbrook: gee, what an actor! Both his class and his versatility are obvious in this film, even more than in The life and death of Colonel Blimp (even though Walbrook's monologue in the latter is absolutely unforgettable). In The red shoes he is everywhere and everything at the same time: the cold and reclusive artist, the inflexible boss, the possessive protector in the throes of a lover's jealousy, the manipulative mastermind, then the broken man. His face, where nearly imperceptible emotions are displayed, is The red shoes' other sheet music.

Little grey fairytales and little white lies: The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson, 2014)

La version française de cet article est disponible ici.

A writer (Tom Wilkinson and his younger self, played by Jude Law) is reminiscing about his encounter, over 20 years ago, with the enigmatic Zero Mustafa (F. Murray Abraham), the elusive owner of the dilapidated Grand Budapest Hotel, crumbling relic of a bygone era and formerly a renowned spa nested in the tiny Eastern European, mountainous Republic of Zubrowka. Much to his surprise, the proverbially secretive old man had begun telling him his incredible story, that of a young refugee with no family (Tony Revolori) who got hired as a lobby boy and became the disciple of the almighty Gustave H. (Ralph Fiennes), the universally praised concierge of the Grand Budapest then at the peak of its glory between the two World Wars.

How could you possibly summarize the plot of movies as multi-faceted as Wes Anderson's - this one in particular? What details, what narrative thread would you cling to, what references would you pick to draw a comparison? Would you rely on the lead provided by the mention "inspired by the work of Stefan Zweig" in the credits? Although I'm not extremely familiar with Zweig's books I was indeed able to feel some of his biting irony here and there. Or would you rather call upon the ghost of the great Ernst Lubitsch, who almost single-handedly invented for Hollywood a singular blend of decadent yet literate Mitteleuropa elegance and American glamour?

For anyone who has ever watched films such as Trouble in Paradise or To be or not to be, it cannot be denied that Gustave H. shares a lot with Lubitsch's leading men, especially in his acrobat's ability to (smartly) land on his feet regardless of the plot's many somersaults and his suave flirtatious ways with the ladies. Moreover, like the latter movie The Grand Budapest Hotel holds on to the belief that the maintenance of certain moral, intellectual as well as esthetic standards are mandatory requirements in the fight against evil in any form. 

Just as would happen in any self-repecting screwball comedy by Lubitsch, the story (which revolves loosely around the suspicious death of the extremely wealthy Madame D. - Tilda Swinton- , one of Gustave H.'s "old blondes" a.k.a. lady protectors, whose legacy to him infuriates the natural heirs) is but a mere pretense to set both characters and events in (rather stochastic) motion. Right from the start it is made clear that this classical "whodunit" subplot is completely dispensable when compared to the irresistible flow of the eccentric fiction washing over an incredibly colorful cast - and mamma mia! what a cast this is: Jeff Goldblum, Willem Dafoe, Saoirse Ronan and Harvey Keitel are all doing a splendid job. Gustave and Zero, like other more or less likely biological or surrogate father-son pairs in previous Anderson's films, have no other solution than to stick together for better or for worse.

As usual with Anderson, the main setting (first shown to us through tongue-in-cheek shots that make him a jolly sibling to The shining's distressing Overlook Hotel!) is an enclosed space, a dollhouse through which characters come and go, and to which they always come back - as if unfailingly bound to it - even though sometimes it is in imagination only. Like the island in Moonrise Kingdom, Rushmore's school, the Belafonte in The life aquatic, The royal Tenenbaums' family house, The Darjeeling Limited's namesake train, the hotel is both a cross-section through an ant farm, bursting at the seams with busy workers and convoluted tunnels inducing the many twists and turns of the plot, and a character in its own right, complete with moods and feelings. 

Bottomline: your cinephilic taste buds will enjoy taking small bites of this delicious Grand Budapest Hotel, just like you would with one of Mendl's legendary Courtisanes au Chocolat in their cute pink box - their only flaw is in never lasting long enough.

Little grey fairytales and little white lies: The Grand Budapest Hotel (Wes Anderson, 2014)

The English version of this post is available here.  

Un écrivain (Tom Wilkinson et sa version "jeune", incarnée par Jude Law) se remémore sa rencontre, une vingtaine d'années auparavant, avec l'énigmatique Zero Mustafa (F. Murray Abraham), propriétaire de l'autrefois prestigieux et désormais fort décrépit Grand Budapest Hotel, établissement thermal niché dans les montagnes de la petite République de Zubrowka, en Europe de l'Est. A sa grande surprise, le vieil homme était sorti de sa légendaire réserve et s'était mis à lui raconter son incroyable histoire, celle d'un jeune lobby boy réfugié et sans attaches (Tony Revolori) devenu le disciple du tout-puissant Gustave H. (Ralph Fiennes), concierge universellement respecté du Grand Budapest alors à l'apogée de sa gloire entre les deux guerres mondiales...

Comment raconter ce film foisonnant de Wes Anderson - je veux dire: particulièrement foisonnant? A quoi se raccrocher, quelles références brandir pour en parler? Faut-il se fier à la mention au générique "inspiré de l'œuvre de Stefan Zweig", dont effectivement on peut percevoir un peu de l'ironie grinçante ici et là (je parle avec précautions, ayant lu très peu des livres de Zweig)? Ou peut-on derechef invoquer les mânes du grand Ernst Lubitsch, qui a quasiment inventé à lui tout seul pour Hollywood un certain mélange d'élégance désuète et cultivée, très Mitteleuropa, et de glamour à l'américaine? 

Il est indéniable en tout cas que les dérapages plus ou moins contrôlés et le badinage aussi frénétique qu'intéressé de Gustave H. l'apparentent aux personnages masculins vus dans Haute pègre (Trouble in paradise) ou encore Jeux dangereux (To be or not to be) - ce dernier ayant de plus en commun avec The Grand Budapest Hotel le message que la préservation d'un certain standard (moral, intellectuel comme esthétique) est la plus sûre forme de résistance contre la barbarie. 

Et ici, de la même manière que chez Lubitsch, l'intrigue ne sert qu'à mettre en mouvement (désordonné, de préférence) les personnages et à provoquer la cascade de rebondissements la plus farfelue qui soit - il s'agit ici de la mort suspecte de la richissime Madame D. (Tilda Swinton), une des "vieilles blondes" bichonnées par Gustave H., et dont le leg controversé à ce dernier provoque l'ire de ses autres héritiers. Il est très vite clair que la question d'élucider les circonstances du décès de Madame D. est totalement accessoire, et que seul compte le flux romanesque de l'histoire qui ballote des personnages plus colorés les uns que les autres (en particulier ceux incarnés respectivement par Jeff Goldblum, Willem Dafoe, Saoirse Ronan et Harvey Keitel - mamma mia quelle distribution!) et conduit le binôme improbable formé par Gustave et Zero à se serrer les coudes, comme avant eux d'autres filiations de fortune formées les films précédents d'Anderson.

Comme de coutume chez Anderson le décor central est un monde clos sur lui-même (que le réalisateur nous présente, non sans une solide dose de malice, comme une réplique burlesque de l'angoissant Overlook Hotel de Shining!), une maison de poupées que les personnages quittent et à laquelle ils reviennent, en imagination ou physiquement, comme attachés à elle par un lien indéfectible. A l'image de l'île de Moonrise Kingdom, de l'école de Rushmore, du navire Belafonte de La vie aquatique, de la maison familiale de La famille Tenenbaum ou du train de A bord du Darjeeling Limited, l'hôtel est à la fois une fourmilière vue en coupe, avec ses minuscules ouvrières et ses tunnels tarabiscotés qui conditionnent les rebondissements de l'histoire, et un personnage à part entière qui colore l'humeur de ceux qui le côtoient. 

Telles les mythiques Courtisanes au Chocolat nichées dans les coquettes boîtes roses du pâtissier Mendl, The Grand Budapest Hotel se déguste à petites bouchées, fait s'envoler les papilles de plaisir, et se termine à regret.