Misericordia Loves Company
A brief review of a slyly fun French sex farce. Plus a close read of the Materialists trailer, and a few words on other movies I recently watched.
Misericordia
Opened in limited release this weekend. Adapted and expanded from my NYFF coverage.
Describing this film involves spouting a bunch of contradictions. It’s a crime thriller that isn’t particularly tense, and a sex farce that doesn’t really have any sex scenes. The byzantine plot could have been exuberantly presented, à la Almodóvar, but longtime filmmaker Alain Guiraudie opts for restrained camp. Misericordia reveals itself to be an incredibly fun movie, but if you just saw the first twenty minutes, which are as dry as a Sauv Blanc, you would think me a liar. Stick with it and you may be won over, as I was.
A young man named Jérémie returns to his hometown, a couple hours outside of Toulouse, to attend the funeral of the local boulanger, under whom he once apprenticed. He sticks around for a few more days, staying at the home of the baker’s widow. As those days turn into weeks, Jérémie’s presence destabilizes everyone around him: the widow’s straitlaced son, a hermetic old schoolmate, the cheerfully nihilistic priest, all are feeling a certain type of way around the guy. At first, we’re not quite sure why Jérémie’s interactions are so charged, but we slowly realize that everyone in this village wants to (pardon my French) fuck this bisexual demon twink, or at least is jealous of the hold that he has on others. An accidental murder kicks the plot into motion, with the victim hastily buried in the outlying forest. Morel mushrooms spring up on that resting place, suspiciously out of season, which is not unnoticed by the local detective.
Guiraudie understatedly directs all of this with confidence, an ethos that extends to the quietly luminous cinematography from Claire Mathon. (She also lensed the beautiful Portrait of a Lady on Fire.) The night shots are realistically dark, but they’re not murky; other DPs should take notes. Misericordia (Latin for “mercy”) winds up very chaotic, and very funny. At first, you’re not sure if you’re supposed to be laughing, but those nervous titters turn into full-hearted guffaws. Everyone in this film is motivated by the power of desire. As one character says to another, “Don’t underestimate it.”
The film is set in the commune of Saint-Martial, close to where Guiraudie grew up. It’s in a forest full of wild mushrooms: porcinis and morels are plentiful. The breakfast of choice in this film is a simple omelette, with the freshly picked fungi folded in. It represents the film well: looks simple, but quite strong once you sink your teeth into it. Copious amounts of pastis are also consumed. The anise spirit is wildly popular in the South of France, which is commonly diluted with mineral water. It was the drink of choice for a fellow I once knew, who hailed from Marseille, and I must say I don’t understand the appeal.
Materializing Materialists
I actively avoid trailers. I break that rule sometimes, and while I haven’t figured out when and why, I did immediately hit play on the preview for Celine Song’s forthcoming Materialists. The early internet discourse compared it to mid-aughts rom coms, but it doesn’t seem particularly funny. Rather, it’s pointing towards the romantic dramas of the eighties, but with dirty, grimy Manhattan replaced with Nora Ephron’s cleaner vision of the city. There was some consternation towards Dakota Johnson’s fake job as a matchmaker, but the unrealistic careers of rom com characters serve to remind the viewer that this is all a fantasy. Just as Cameron Diaz wouldn’t actually be able to afford a mansion as a movie trailer editor, you will likewise never meet a hotly widowed Jude Law in the English countryside after crashing out during the Christmas holiday.
Sometimes, I watch trailers after seeing the movie in question. It can be a revealing exercise in how films are marketed. A pivotal moment from the climax could show up as an out of context clip, or a cameo could seem like a much larger role. What kind of movie is the distributor trying to sell, and does that adequately represent the entire picture? The trailer for Past Lives, Song’s debut feature, was a canny exercise in obfuscation. It sold you a romance-focused love triangle, when the film is really a story about a woman coming into her own as an artist and an immigrant. I found that to be a much more interesting picture than Before Sunset redux, but some of my friends felt a bit cheated. So this preview of Song’s follow up is a bit intriguing, and it seems like a riff on Hitch crossed with a bit of The Philadelphia Story: Dakota Johnson’s work as a matchmaker has generated nine marriages, but she is perpetually single herself. She meets a rich guy but feels an attraction to the scruffy working class fella.
In this trailer, there are interview-esque sequences where people tell the camera/Dakota Johnson what they’re looking for in a romantic partner. They’re likely interspersed throughout the final film, as in When Harry Met Sally. We quickly establish a love triangle: Pedro Pascal is a wealthy “unicorn” who seems to be the perfect man, but she also encounters an old connection in Chris Evans, slumming it out as a caterer (he doesn’t seem to be no Jimmy Stewart). This hints at Song exploring the influence of class divisions in romantic partnerships, though who knows if this will be explored in a satisfying manner, but the “Material Girl” cover leans into this reading. We’ll have to see in June, when the film is released!
My New York location-spotting isn’t strong enough to identify all the fancy hotels and restaurants featured through this Materialists trailer, but the exteriors seem to be downtown. If you recognize any of the places, please let me know because I want to do some recon.
Brief Words on Several Movies I Saw Recently
Presence — An Asian household where everyone wears shoes inside??? That's the real horror movie. Nonetheless, this was a great film whose ghostly perspective merely frames an intense anatomy of a family falling apart.
History Is Made at Night (1937) — third-time rewatch. Utterly delightful and bonkers, and I need to host a dinner and a movie party for this one because I love this one so much… will first need to perfect my Lobster Cardinale with Sauce à la Cesare.
East of Eden (1955) — Glad one of my friends had read the Bible at some point in his life so that he could tell us all about the Cain & Abel stuff that Steinbeck was riffing on. I'm a big fan of beans so I enjoyed all the bean talk. Rancho Gordo Bean Club represent!! James Dean, yup one of the hottest men alive, along with that bunch of original Method actors (Marlon Brando, Monty Clift, Paul Newman). I watched this on my TV, where the entire 2.55:1 frame is in my field of vision. But if I had seen this on an ultrawide CinemaScope screen in 1955, the edges of the screen would probably be in my peripherals. There's a shot near the beginning of the film that especially makes use of this: Cal and his dad are seated on opposite sides of the dining table, consequently each man is on opposite sides of the shot. With a large enough screen, you'd have to pivot your head back and forth, making physical for the viewer the distance between father and son.
Paddington in Peru — You can feel the absence of the franchise’s original writers, but their touch persists in the overall plot (Paul King and Simon Farnaby retain story credits). The ending does get us back to the magic of the first two Paddington movies. If those were celebrations of a multicultural Britain, a kind and polite rebuttal to the Brexit era, this movie is a quaintly facile yarn about an immigrant getting back in touch with his roots, without having to lose any love for his adopted country.
Mickey 17 — I'm just happy that Bong Joon-ho got a truckload of money to make a bizarre, satirical sci-fi movie about the intersections of capitalism and authoritarianism and imperialism, a Warner Bros studio project that leaves the director's distinctive voice intact. There are some very hot people in this movie: Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie, Anamaria Vartolomei. Was hoping for a Mickey 4-some 😕
Bonjour Tristesse (2025) — Speaking of hot people, I can’t be too mad about a couple hours spent watching them laze about Sud-de-France. Durga Chew-Bose’s new adaptation of the mid-century French bestseller (which had spawned a 1958 film that I ought to watch) is very stylish and gorgeous to look at; “gorgeous gorgeous gowns” was the phrase I heard repeatedly at the post-screening reception. But psychological motivations are frustratingly communicated at a surface level. We don't see past the artifice that the characters (and the director?) have constructed for themselves. The shots are beautifully constructed, but what are they in service of beyond Call Me By Your Name vibes? Buttered toast figures prominently, and oddly enough, food is one of the only elements that goes beyond mere aesthetics to convey insights into the characters, however facile. Witness Chloë Sevigny’s character intricately slicing a pineapple: she strives for cleanliness and proper presentation, but you can’t avoid getting a little messy. (I saw this at Museum of the Moving Image’s First Look festival, but it opens in cinemas May 2 via Greenwich Entertainment.)
Black Bag — A fun, sexy romp of a spy mystery. Dare I say it's even a lil' horny? There's no particular insight into contemporary geopolitics; director Steven Soderbergh and screenwriter David Koepp are just trying to give us a good time. Perhaps you could see it as a gentle indictment of how the constant obfuscation/bureaucracy within intelligence services leads to factional infighting. The slick surfaces and hermetic interior spaces lend the proceedings a more serious feeling when the plot is pure fluff. Amp up the satire and this is just Veep transposed to MI6. Such an enjoyable picture that will make you long for a committed, rock solid marriage as the one between Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett.
On My Radar
New movies that I’m looking forward to watching… there are not many…
Out now
Grand Theft Hamlet (VOD, will probably pair with Ghostlight, which I didn’t get a chance to watch last year and is also about producing a Shakespeare play)
On Becoming A Guinea Fowl (In cinemas)
March 28
Death of a Unicorn
April 11
Warfare
The Amateur
April 18
The Wedding Banquet (though v apprehensive because I’m such a fan of the Ang Lee original)
Sinners