In the past few weeks, I've been asked many times why I do what I do for Ain't It Cool News, both in public and in private e-mail. There are many reasons. First, I do it because I have found a kindred spirit and a good friend in Harry Knowles, perhaps the only person I have ever met more crazy in love with movies than I am. Second, I do it because I enjoy the dialogue that's been opened with you, our readers. Third, I do it because even if I didn't have this particular platform for publication, I'd still be doing all the same things... reading scripts, seeing every possible early screening of a film, visiting sets... because I was doing that long before there was an AICN, just for the sake of my own continuing education about this business and this art.
But there's one reason that supercedes all others, and I got a very potent reminder of that last week when John Robie and I were fortunate enough to attend a screening of Patrice Leconte's beautiful and luminous new film LA FILLE SUR LA PONT, or GIRL ON THE BRIDGE. It's beginning its theatrical rollout today in New York and Los Angeles, and I can't say this strongly enough: if you love movies, you owe it to yourself to experience this incandescent marvel on the big screen. It's one of those wonderful surprises that caught me off-guard, turned me inside out, and stole my heart, and it will do the same to you.
This film's not exactly a secret. I've heard critics rumbling about it since Telluride last year. It was nominated for eight Cesar awards, and lead actor Daniel Auteuil won for Best Actor, deservedly. It's his performance as Gabor that gives the film its beating heart, and he brings a remarkable hangdog charisma to the proceedings. There's something incomplete about Gabor, and he's obviously a man who has been battered about by life. He needs someone to complete him, to make his act work, and the toll that it takes is written large in those features of his. He's got the second greatest face in the film, the winner of that particular contest being Vanessa Paradis, a radiant presence here. Leconte is in love with these faces, and by the end of the film, you will be, too.
For me, it took all of ten minutes to fall head over heels for Paradis. That's about the length of the mesmerizing opening sequence in which we meet Adele, a young woman who speaks with an unseen offscreen inquisitor about love and luck and her life so far. Adele speaks frankly of the way she has always defined herself through the men she's slept with. "Life only starts when you make love. Until then, you're nothing," she says. Adele truly believes that she is doomed, that love is no good for her. Paradis is funny and quick and so alive in this scene, making Adele's complaints of failed love seem preposterous. Her easy gap-toothed smile lights her up, her slight imperfections lending her a glow, a classic beauty that would suggest immeasurable inner joy.
Still, when we next see Adele, she's standing on the edge of the bridge, staring down into the icy black water of the Seine, tears drying on her cheeks. As she considers the jump, she is approached by Gabor, who almost immediately tunes into Adele's doomed sense of fatalism. "We always think that luck is that which we don't have," Gabor says, daring her not to jump. He speaks to her of luck and the potential for change. He offers her a chance at change. And when she's heard all his talk and entertained his offer, she jumps anyway. Gabor goes after her, rescues her. In the hospital where they are taken to warm up, he makes her an offer. He is a knife thrower, and he needs a target. If her life is so useless, he reasons, then why not take this risk? Adele can't resist his reasoning, and they leave together.
Gabor assures Adele at first that he has no romantic intentions for her. He takes her out shopping, takes her to have her hair styled, spends money to make sure that the rough edges are all smoothed out and that she is a sleek, stunning version of herself. "The audience has to fall in love with you," he tells her, and in their first performance together, which her performs blindfolded, the audience does exactly that. Part of what makes the scene so great is the way Leconte makes the experience almost completely subjective, forcing us to feel the terror of a knife nicking us as it slams home into think wood, sticking. What spins out from that unlikely start is audacious and funny and sexy, a fairy tale drenched in romance, told with all the energy of last year's arthouse hit RUN LOLA RUN. Shot in lush black-and-white by Jean-Marie Dreujou, this is not as grungy or as edgy as LOLA. In many ways, this is a throwback to the pre-New Wave French cinema, glamorous and lovely. The look of this world keeps us from ever imagining that this is meant to be real, but at the same time, the black and white keeps the fairy tale from ever becoming so much lighter than air that it just floats away. There's one image in particular, a rainbow captured in black and white, that took my breath away. Leconte manages to dazzle us with our own world, just by seeing it through the eyes of these two people.
One of the greatest romantic films I've ever seen is Woody Allen's MANHATTAN, and this film definitely brought that picture to mind. There's the black and white, the amazing use of score, and the mix of unabashed romanticism and stark reality makes both films feel like remembered dreams. Near the end of MANHATTAN, Ike (Woody Allen) has made a terrible mistake in letting Tracy (Muriel Hemingway) go off to school in Europe without telling her how much he cares for her. As he sits, trying to work, trying to think of anything but her, he starts to make a list of the things that make life worth living. As he runs through his list, he surprises himself by saying, "Tracy's face." There's a great moment as he sits and lets that confession reverberate for himself before Allen cuts to Ike running through the streets, en route to find Tracy and tell her. There's a moment of realization here, a thunderclap in which someone realizes the truth about their own attraction to someone else, in which mere want becomes need, and it's so true, so earned, that I had to fight back laughter. Leconte just astonishes me here. The way he brings the film to visual life with quick cuts, the handheld camerawork that zooms in on odd details, the overall rhythms that are established by Joelle Hache's outstanding editing -- it's all in service of creating a spell that pulls us into the fim, that forces us to fall in love. Leconte knows the feeling, knows the way all of our senses conspire against us, and he has found a way of capturing those exact feelings and sensations on film. This follows films like RIDICULE, THE HAIRDRESSER'S HUSBAND, and MONSIEUR HIRE, all great in their own right, and cements Leconte as one of the sharpest, most important voices in international cinema.
By the time this film wraps up, there's no major sex scenes, no giant declarations of endless love. Instead, we are presented with something real, something fragile and new, and it's so much more satisfying as a result. I love these two people. I love the feeling that enveloped me as I watched this story unfold. I look forward to seeing this again this weekend, and to eventually owning and enjoying the film for years to come. This is an instant classic, if only for a knife throwing scene that comes at a crucial point in the relationship between Adele and Gabor, a moment in which the both of them turn the simple act of throwing knives into something else, something holy that only the two of them share and understand. The trust and the fear and the desire all combine to create one of the most erotically charged moments I can remember on film. If you're lucky enough to be in love this weekend and you want to share this film with someone special, or if you just want to feel as if you've found that new love, then make the effort and search this one out.
