roots of hatred

Three decades of writing and directing, with about fifteen mid-level and even notable works, is enough background to believe that Arnaud Desplechin will emerge unscathed from walking this rocky road. It is undertaken by two brothers (brilliant and famous in their fields, she a theater actress, he a writer) who hate each other deeply, although in the end they do not quite understand where the roots of such behavior lie and even if they will not dry up after twenty years. Or if, as the title for the Spanish market suggests, they are just the main part of a chronicle of family events involving both parents and brother, their partners, and also her teenage son and a trusted friend and doctor, the link between the two. A conglomerate of feelings, often contradictory, which at times seems to require the viewer’s complicity to engage in a full emotional dissection, undoubtedly sincere even though the interweaving of sequences threatens to distance you from the drama.

The intensity that Marion Cotillard and Melvil Poupaud bring to their characters, Cotillard in particular, gives their registers coherence to the chaos that seems to dominate much of the footage. With a close bond at a young age, the product of a peculiar upbringing, but also the result of creative talent, their parents’ unfortunate car accident leads to their final meeting in the hospital despite years of avoiding each other. Already the opening sequence suggests that something is not right when her brother throws her out of the house shouting when she goes to mourn the death of his only son, still a child. It will remain to explore the reasons for the drama in a very French tone, tightening up in some scenes and loosening up in others, to culminate in a catharsis, although foreshadowed or expected, not for that reason necessary at the risk of false closure. There is no fraud despite what some critics at Cannes pointed out. It’s just that some situations result in unpleasant digestion due to excessive forcing.

FAMILY MEANS

France. 2022. Director: Arnaud Desplechin. Cast: Marion Cotillard, Melvil Poupaud, Golshifteh Farahani, Patrick Timsit.

108 min.