28 December 2009

A Christmas Carol, Robert Zemeckis


A Christmas Carol is the classic tale by Charles Dickens about a miser - Ebenezer Scrooge - during the Victorian era in England, making everyones life as well as his own rather miserable.
It's a man who doesn't like seeing other people happy or wanting to help anyone but himself.
This tale has been told in many a various and fascinating versions and this one was also fascinating in its own particular way. Director Robert Zemeckis has done a good job or rather the technical staff around him.
First of all one have to give credit to those working with the animations/the techical side of the film. Nowadays animated films are so well done that it takes something special to make an impression and in this particular case I think they have succeeded.
The most particular figure of all was of course Ebenezer Scrooge himself.
Both they way he is depicted, how he talks and reacts faced with all the peculiar things happening around him, made him both tragic and funny.
That he is a man of few emotions is clearly shown both by his actions - or lack of actions - and appearance.
The different ghosts haunting him and wanting him to repent - or die - are all very different but the most fearsome one is however his former - now dead - colleague.
The second one in fire is quite cuddleome.
The third ghost, an incarnation of Santa from Hell, is somewhat tiresome with his recurrent laugh: "How, how, how!"
As we all know Scrooge decides to live on, changing his way of life. This after having seen his life in retrospective (thanks to the ghosts), displaying all the lost chances in life, the opportunities whereby he could have done something good both for others and for himself.
He undergoes a metamorphosis and becomes the benevolent maecenas!
The story follows the original Dickens very well although maybe not in details. It's long since I read the book whereby I can't claim this with certainty.

Among the visitors in the cinema there were many children (with parents) and I think that a story of this kind is more suited for us adults, depending of course on the references and expectations of the children - and their parents.
In older times, however, children were told stories by the Brothers Grimm and these stories - and the stories by H.C. Andersen - were by no means nice and harmless!

I didn't see this film in 3D but from what I saw I can imagine that this is a powerful experience.
However nothing new was added to the story and I wasn't surprised by any particular element in the film, more impressed - as I wrote - by the technical skill, sometimes eradicating the border between 'real' and animation!
When it comes to creating a certain ambience corresponding to a time and a place, I'm not as impressed. Compared to a film like Rattatouille, the latter succeeded much better.
A happy end in Christmas times might also add to the plus.

27 December 2009

Le Vilain, Albert Dupontel





This day we intended to see A Christmas Carol by Robert Zemeckis at Cinéma Lux in La Châtre but we missed it because it began earlier than we had thought (or than I, Gunnar, had thought to be more exact).

Instead we watched the french film Le Vilain (The Vilain) by Albert Dupontel who also had one of two leading roles. In the second leading role we could see Catherine Frot.
This is a story about an old woman - Maniette (Frot) - who together with her neighbours tries to fight back the plans to build a bank on the same site as their houses is situated. The property developers has succeeded in buying free some estates but this stubborn woman and some of her neighbour-friends don't want to move.
One day her son Sidney Thomas (Dupontel) - whom she hasn't met for twenty years - knocks on her door. He is chased by a van with vilains trying to kill him. He seeks a refuge and finds his old home where his mother still lives.
Spontaneously she becomes very happy but what she doesn't know at first is that he is a 'vilain' - a bank robber.
She finds however some evidence pointing in the direction to him, displaying aspects of his personality she didn't know of and soon she finds out that he's not at all working in a bank (as he had told her).
It also seems as if she can't die (even though she wants to) as long as he is living the life he lives. God obviously has a plan for her life, wanting her to make him a better son, or at least this is what she thinks.
When the son get's to know that his mother will die if he behaves good and becomes a decent person, he tries hard to fulfill this her wishes. If his mother dies he will inherit her!
He even tries to kill her but she is well aware of this and now an interesting game emurges between the two and this is interfoliated by the story about the struggle between the bank and the house owners among other things.
Maniette however now realizes that she can use her son in this her effort to fight back the plans of this property developer.

How it ends? Well...................................

To say something concerning the two principal actors:
Personally I think that Albert Dupontel is an actor and a director who deserves being better known outside France. He has in his acting displayed a diversity in characters and a versatility that makes him interesting.
This goes for his films too. Although this is'nt his best film, it's however a charming œuvre with a lot of warmth and humor.
He actually started of as a medical student and in some of his films you find a somewhat particular doctor and this goes for the above film too.
Catherine Frot is an actress, not as well known as some of her french 'acting sisters' and this is a pitty as she also has a multitude of 'strings on her acting harp', spanning from dramatic to comic roles.
A minus in this film was her make up. If the intention was to make her look old, they didn't succeed. This became obvious in the scenes with men and women in 'a certain age' acting along side her.
This was a light comedy but as such rather charming as I said and in some way I saw a certain resemblance with œuvres by Peter Sellers or Alec Guiness (in his comic roles). Maybe I'm wrong but this was just a feeling I had.
The film had some superficial aesthetic affinity with films by Jeunet.

20 December 2009

Le petit Nicholas


Obviously this film has been a great success in France why they are running it again.
Last time this film was shown at Cinéma Lux in La Châtre we missed it but tonight we attended this 'extra screening'.
This is a very charming film about the young Nicholas and his friends at a boarding school.
We get introduced to his friends with Nicholas voice over telling us about their different characteristics.
The director and the responsible for the casting has really succeeded in finding different characters for the different rôles in this film.
The intelligent, very studious boy with spectacles, the always tired one being punished for not doing his homeworks, the big, fat boy eating all the time and so forth.
It's somewhat like the seven dwarfs in Snow White, though not identical with them.
One of the boys tells the others that he is going to have a brother (or sister of course but these boys can only imagine it will be a brother as girls are no good anyway) and this makes him sad as he is convinced that his parents will neglect him and only pay attention to the 'newcomer'.
Before his parents told him the news about them having a child and him becoming a brother, they acted strangely, according to him.
The other boys wants to know how and he delineates some of the 'strange behaviours'.
One day Nicholas finds his parents acting in a similar way and he now fears that they are going to have another child and that he is going to become a brother.
From now one starts a process in which his friends participate. They have to get rid of this little brother of Nicholas when he is born. Nicholas don't want him to intrude and create 'problems' in their family relation. Among many other things they decide to hire a villain to 'kidnap' and abduct him. It's however not as easy as one might think or rather as they have thought it to be.
Parallell to this story we also get to follow other 'side stories' like the daily 'work' at school, getting to know the different teachers - also with special characteristics - being acquainted with the parents of Nicholas when they, among other things, wants to prepare a dinner for Nicholas fathers chief.
The scene with the dinner is magnificent! This very much thanks to the actress Valérie Lemercier who is a wonderful comédienne, acting with small but effective means, being the somewhat neurotic mother.
In all her eagerness to prepare a perfect dinner, she of course spoiles everything!
There is a particular scene where she want's to impress on her husbands boss and his wife, talking about 13th century Scandinavian litterature, trying to prononce the name of Snorre Sturlasson! It's just fantastic!
The actors are generally very good and it's not least impressing to see the young boys displaying a tremendously talented acting with a lot of humour and wit.

12 December 2009

Soirée Opéra at Lion d'Argent

Tonight we are going to visit the restaurant Lion d'Argent in La Châtre for an evening with Dinner and Opera.
This is the first time this restaurant arrange an event like this and it will be very interesting to participate, though only as spectators and listeners. I'm not going to sing (I think) and nor will Aurore (I think)!
In Stockholm we have a restaurant called Regina with the same concept. We will write more about our experiences from this evening in next post!

French/Français:

L’équipe du Lion d’Argent de La Châtre organise pour la première fois une soirée opéra le 12 décembre 2009. Cette soirée débutera à 19h et comprendra :

- Un apéritif concert
- Un dîner, boissons comprises
- Une deuxième partie de concert

Brigitte Diguet (soprano), Dominique Gérard (soprano), Joëlle Chaillou-Chouraki (pianiste) et Arnaud Oreb (pianiste) interprèteront des œuvres de Mozart, Haydn, Schumann, Offenbach, Bizet, Bellini...

(Photo Lion d'Argent copied from: http://www.google.fr/images?q=lion+d%27argent+la+chatre&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:fr:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&hl=fr&tab=wi)