Friday 5 April 2013

Film: 'DANS LA MAISON'

A delightful, light-touch, mystery-comedy from Francois Ozon who seems to have a growing knack of coming up with films of intriguing, original storylines which lodge in the memory long afterwards.

Fabrice Luchini plays a rather dull and bored schoolteacher whose interest in his work is suddenly aroused when one of his teenage pupils presents him with a particularly well-written essay of how he has wheedled himself into the family home of a classmate under the pretext of helping him with his maths difficulties. He ends his composition with the words "A suivre" (to be continued), picking it up later with what turns out to be a whole series of instalments, hooking not only the teacher but his art-gallery manager wife, the always marvellous Kristin Scott Thomas (who now seems to be appearing with more regularity in French language films than English). He shows her the first essay, ostensibly because of his pupil's superior use of language and very soon her curiosity is also aroused. She too is drawn into the drama of what the boy is up to, each instalment leaving on a 'cliff-hanger' as the pupil describes how he begins, not only to snoop around his friend's house whilst leaving him to do maths exercises, but also to eavesdrop on the conversations of the latter's parents. The teacher and wife are constantly wondering if what the pupil says he did actually happened - and so are we. Then the teacher gets so involved that when there's threat that the boy might have to stop helping his friend he intervenes to do something borderline criminal so that he'll be allowed to carry on as before. It takes a serious turn or two as the intruding youth gets ever-closer to the mother, both physically and emotionally, but I think these are justified as they serve to point up the amusing parts by giving the story some shadow in its light-hearted approach. And it all ends in really the only way it could, leaving me with a satisfying, though appropriately incomplete, smile.

It's a film that doesn't go for the really big laughs or the grand gestures. Maybe those which puzzle the audience into wondering the difference between truth and reality have become very voguish now, but this one plays it with a neat, confident touch. 
As in several of Ozon's films there is a bit of gay angle to part of the storyline (here quite slight), though it does afford the 'excuse' for a quite sudden and gratuitous, very brief homophobic put-down, something I always find particularly wounding, though maybe that's just me. 

A very worthwhile film and, with the exception of 'Cloud Atlas' (and maybe 'Lincoln') my most enjoyed film of this year so far..................................7.5/10


14 comments:

  1. Delighted to see that you gave France's 'bad boy' Francois Ozon's new film such a high mark. Ever since I saw "Water Drops On Burning Rock" years ago, I have made it a point to see every film he has directed. I felt he strayed a little with "Potiche," but still it was an enjoyable little piece of work. Will certainly be on the lookout for this one.

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  2. I'll be very surprised if you don't like this one a lot, Paul. It' s pretty deftly executed - and with a uniformly fine cast for both pairs of parents as well as the two boys. If it was a bit predictable that there'd be an attraction between the 'invader' and his friend's mother that's about my only criticism. Hope you manage to see it showing in a cinema, though it will also work fine on small screen (Maybe even better?).
    After reminding myself about 'Potiche' I think I agree with you. I see I gave it a '6' - in other words, fair enough but ought to have been better. But generally, Ozon is definitely a name to watch - and he's still comparatively young!

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  3. As a huge fan of French cinema, I was already sold on this Ray. I agree about KST - she's always superb and I never fail to be impressed at her language skills.
    It's sounds superb, thanks for the review.

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  4. PS - I went through 8 word verification choices before I found one I could read properly! Why on earth are some of them so difficult to read (I suppose I know the answer to that)!

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    1. Yes, our Kristin never gives a less than ravishing performance - and does so again here in this film I just KNOW you'll love.

      Must confess, Craig, that I'm a bit baffled by what this second comment means. Is it a difficulty that is peculiar to my blog, or maybe also happens with a few others too? I never have problems reading the blogs of others (or am I mis-reading what you say?) - though some of them (not yours) do take an awfully long time to come up on screen.

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  5. Hi Ray... in settings and then posts & comments there is a selection for "show word verification" which Google defaults to "on". You can change it to "off". Keeping it on keeps out spam comments but I've found that if you turn it off and disable anonymous comments it has the same effect as spammers are always anonymous!
    It's not unique to your blog - for some reason the visuals which Google ask us to copy today were very complicated and hard to read. They must have been testing me!

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    1. I've done what you suggest, Craig - at least I've turned off 'word verification' . But I'm not too sure about the second part of what you've said. What I have now done is change from allowing comments from 'Anyone' to allowing only those from 'Registered Users'. If that does the trick as I hope it will, fine, otherwise I'll have to go back and reverse it. But, fingers crossed.

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    2. Hi Ray, trying now, will confirm with another reply in a moment.

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    3. Hi Ray: No word verification now so much easier for me, thank you. But please, if you start getting spam, please turn it back on. Usually the words aren't too awful to read but yesterday the images were incredibly vague and difficult. Blogger must have been having a hard day!

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    4. Thanks Craig. Pleased it's working so I'll leave it as it is for now - and until/if I have spam problems, in which case I'll let you and others know.

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  6. I would love this one..... I will look out for it...but as we are in Wales I bet I won't arrive here til the autumn

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    1. It's one which I reckon will be exclusively confined to 'art-house' venues, J.G. So if you don't see it there I fear it will either be when it's on telly (but it may not ever be) or you rent it. But whatever you do it'll well be worth the effort.

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    2. We do have one arthouse cinema Ray!

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    3. Then it ought to come, J.G. It's been generally well-received and quite a popular film so if it doesn't get round to your own 'local' then there ain't no justice! Hope you'll let is know somehow if and when you see it.

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