Emmanuel Mouret

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swo17
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#26 Post by swo17 » Tue Jan 29, 2019 11:26 am

Awesome, good luck with that!

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#27 Post by domino harvey » Fri Feb 08, 2019 1:45 pm

Unlike that dreaded Happy Endings reunion, I was actually able to buy tickets for this! And the Amanda screening with Hers' Q&A!

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soundchaser
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#28 Post by soundchaser » Mon Feb 11, 2019 1:42 am

I watched Caprice tonight and, while I wasn’t as totally blown away with it as domino, I like it more the further I think about it (which I suppose is fitting, given certain events in the film).

It’s not an original observation, but Mouret is clearly a gifted physical comedian in the style of Tati - the setpiece with his broken leg is a great one, and even his small facial expressions are charming almost to a fault. These overtly comic moments are where Mouret shines the strongest as an actor.

But where he really surprised me was as a writer - I think the script is much deeper than it appears on the surface. My thoughts aren’t extraordinarily coherent at the moment, but there’s a lot here about not only the illusion of male fantasy (which domino has expounded upon in his opening post) but also the nature of monogamous love, the apparent difficulty of gender-disparate friendships, and the danger of the parts of ourselves we may not even know exist. It’s for this last concern that Mouret’s Clément traps his own present in a kind of living memory, in contrast with Caprice, who performs in a collaborative play set thousands of years in the future. (I love the title of Clément’s play: “The Unfortunate Need for Love.” It’s a fantastic summation of a character whose feelings even he finds impossible to comprehend.)

But Caprice’s theater scene is absolutely transcendent. It’s not only a diegetic nod to what’s come before (Caprice and her friend buy Clément and Thomas drinks in the bar to break their gender role; the play mentions such a blurring of gender) but also a summation of the film’s thematic questions: what does an “intersection” involving more than two people look like? Is it something we aren’t equipped to handle? Or is it our next evolutionary step? I have conflicted emotions about polyamory myself - are those because of something inherent within me, or is there a societal restriction I should be able to move past? At the risk of not answering any of these questions, let me just sum up the scene by saying that it’s astonishingly beautiful to look at.

And that’s just one of the gorgeous shots here - the pan down to the flowers blooming outside of Alicia’s apartment, the aquarium backlighting a dangerously intimate conversation, Clément’s phone ringing after what could be a final cut to black. It’s a pretty film even when not showing off, but those flashier moments are just impossible not to admire.

I’ll definitely have to check out some of Mouret’s earlier work. Even if they’re not as thematically rich or beautifully shot as this one, I’m sure they’ll be a lovely way to spend an evening.

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#29 Post by domino harvey » Mon Feb 11, 2019 2:29 am

Beautiful thoughts. Wait til it lives in your head some more, that warm glow only grows in memory

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Aunt Peg
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#30 Post by Aunt Peg » Mon Feb 11, 2019 8:48 am

Anyone know when Mademoiselle de Joncquières will 'drop' on Netflix?

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#31 Post by domino harvey » Sat Mar 02, 2019 2:29 am

Aunt Peg wrote:
Mon Feb 11, 2019 8:48 am
Anyone know when Mademoiselle de Joncquières will 'drop' on Netflix?
Straight from the horse’s mouth, it will be added March 8th, under the ill-fitting title Lady J. Other than the Lincoln Center screenings, there will be no theatrical release whatsoever of the film in America. That’s too bad, because the audience was very receptive and vocal (esp during the great extended middle revenge section), and this is honestly structured all wrong for Netflix success: the first 15 mins or so are intentionally placid and will drive a lot of curious lookie-loos away

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#32 Post by Aunt Peg » Sat Mar 02, 2019 9:01 am

Just checked Netflix it commences on the same date in my part of the world. Probably won't get around to it until 13 March, as I start a film festival of French films of which I am seeing 21. Have to squeeze this in along with Leaving Neverland.

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#33 Post by domino harvey » Fri Mar 08, 2019 2:17 pm

Mademoiselle de Joncquières (as Lady J) is now up on Netflix (and English subs are up you-know-where for those without NF). This is the best of the three Mouret films now available for American audiences to stream, and in lieu of me writing it up, I hope to engage the responses of others instead. Go watch!

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#34 Post by mfunk9786 » Fri Mar 08, 2019 2:17 pm

Did you have the opportunity to speak directly with Mouret this past weekend?

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#35 Post by domino harvey » Fri Mar 08, 2019 2:23 pm

I did after the Q&A, and he was every bit as pleasant, laid-back, and witty as you'd expect. When I told him what a big fan I was, he drolly replied, "Well, I will continue to make movies then"

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swo17
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#36 Post by swo17 » Fri Mar 08, 2019 2:27 pm

That's awesome

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#37 Post by DarkImbecile » Fri Mar 08, 2019 2:34 pm

Now if his next movie is terrible, we all know who to blame.

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Mr Sheldrake
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#38 Post by Mr Sheldrake » Sat Mar 09, 2019 2:16 pm

Lady J

I admired the two lead performances, the slow burning suspense, the aesthetic rigor. The revenge (and some of the movie) went sour with the thinly developed mother/daughter and their exploitation. It's curiously under-populated except for the servants, always lingering, privy to the plotting, one might think one of them would would have informed the Marquis for a price, but maybe that's too Dickens.

The moral fable (if that was intended) didn't resonate, it fit too neatly into the woman scorned genre. I can't shake the Rohmer resemblance but I've only seen this and Venus and Fleur.

I tried to find the Diderot novel. No luck on Amazon unless it's part of a collection, or under a different title, perhaps not translated.

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#39 Post by domino harvey » Sat Mar 09, 2019 3:42 pm

Mr Sheldrake wrote:
Sat Mar 09, 2019 2:16 pm
The moral fable (if that was intended) didn't resonate, it fit too neatly into the woman scorned genre.
I would say one key difference here than in other revenge movies is the fluidity of culpability. As with every Mouret film save his other drama, Une autre vie, there are no real villains here, and you could make a plausible case for morally supporting the actions and behaviors of any of the four main players:
SpoilerShow
De France has been "wronged," but she also brought it on herself by issuing a test of love built on a lie that doesn't turn out as she'd hoped. Her revenge is vicariously enjoyable, especially in how it manipulates the "good" aspects of Baer, but her callous dismissal of her actresses, completely misleading them in her intentions (they know the game at the outset, but then de France convinces the pair she's grown fond of them apart from their function, which of course isn't true as shown during the humiliation scene in which de France is legit confused at what they're upset about, since they'll be paid for their services) makes her actions less fun as the film goes on. And her fictive happiness in the end, predicated on the lying sympathy of her friend, pales to the genuine happiness Baer finds in falling in love with the daughter on his own terms and with his eyes open-- an echo of the similar honest love found in a relationship built on a fundamental lie in L'art d'aimer. Again, Mouret prioritizes self-driven motivations free from external pressure or interference, and in this way both de France and Baer have a happy ending. But Baer's is more true and fulfilling because it is not predicated on the lies that made it possible, whereas de France's is a state of eternally blissful delusion-- the same thing she'd had were she never to have spoken up to test Baer's love in the first place!
++++++
Mr Sheldrake wrote:
Sat Mar 09, 2019 2:16 pm
I tried to find the Diderot novel. No luck on Amazon unless it's part of a collection, or under a different title, perhaps not translated.
The film's narrative is taken from a long story recounted within Jacques le fataliste et son maître, so it's not a straight adaptation. If you recognize the skeleton of the plot, it's because Bresson also based Les dames du Bois de Boulogne on the same material

Here's one of the many versions of Jacques the Fatalist up on Amazon

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#40 Post by domino harvey » Thu Apr 11, 2019 11:01 pm

A month later and no one else has seen Mademoiselle de Joncquières or has anything to say if they have? C'mon folks, 90% of you have access to this right now

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swo17
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#41 Post by swo17 » Thu Apr 11, 2019 11:57 pm

I thought it was great! Sort of a more plausible, grounded version of something like The Favourite, and in its own way more cruel. (And yet also touching and hopeful. I like the point you made about everyone getting their own "happy ending.")

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#42 Post by Never Cursed » Fri Apr 12, 2019 4:22 pm

I read that this morning, domino, and immediately queued the film up! And as it turns out, Mademoiselle de Joncquières is pretty great, acerbic and sharp and genuinely funny in its leisurely chronology of a revenge. All four of the principal actors are a lot of fun, and I especially liked Edouard Baer and his desperate rogue in fun comic setups like the dinner scene or the montage of him stalking the titular Mademoiselle at church. I'll second the "more realistic and cruel The Favourite" comparison with the caveat that I liked this movie a lot more than that one (sorry domino/DarkImbecile/most of the forum), which I admit is a bit weird, but I felt a lot less of the condescension, for lack of a better word, that I got from The Favourite, if only because I appreciated this film's more nuanced and ultimately less nasty view of its characters. It's just so nice to wash one's palette with something as pleasantly droll as this that I don't even know why I tolerate some of the more cynical stuff sometimes. Anyway, can't wait to binge the next season of It's Always Sunny...

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#43 Post by domino harvey » Sat Apr 13, 2019 12:16 am

Indeed, I think you’ll find, should the world ever make it possible to do so, that nearly all of Mouret’s films exhibit similar world views in that he values his characters and respects their choices, which results in a warmth generated in earnest but without cheesiness or cloying tendencies. The victories he lets his characters find are triumphs he celebrates, but which they also earn for themselves

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#44 Post by soundchaser » Mon Apr 15, 2019 11:48 pm

Finally got around to this tonight, and if it’s not one of my Top 5 for the year, I’ll be gobsmacked. The best parts of Rivette’s Ne Touchez Pas le Hache (the emotional distancing, the unbroken long-take conversations, the joy of revenge games), but with the lightness of touch that I enjoyed in Caprice. If you can stomach costume drama at all, you should watch this one - it’s fab. (Don’t judge either film by its terrible American title!)

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#45 Post by therewillbeblus » Wed Apr 17, 2019 7:02 pm

Finally watched Mademoiselle de Joncquières and Mouret did it again, pulling off an environmental shift to the costume drama with his distinctive light touch and complex characterizations, much like Whit Stillman did a few years ago with Love and Friendship. As others have noted, Mouret has always shown great respect and compassion towards his characters, never pigeonholing then into good vs. bad tropes. He embraces moral relativism in the lightest possible way, because he focuses his attention on emotions, specifically love, and understands that the act of falling and staying in love is far more complicated a process than most films choose to treat it as, often filtering a situation through one character’s perspective on events and asking the audience to ally with their subjective experience alone. Throughout his body of work, Mouret’s characters consistently experience feelings outside of their control and battle with the consequences of said feelings in moral terms. This film exposes this idea more clearly than any of the other Mouret films I’ve seen by focusing so evenly on multiple points of view.
SpoilerShow
At first we are meant to see Baer’s inevitable ‘falling out’ of love with De France as typical of the manipulative womanizer/playboy role, with her as the naive innocent, but as the film ends with him (potentially) finding true love in another, moments throughout the film that were previously perceived as coercive and insincere become authentic (i.e. when Baer tells De France early on that his ‘conquests’ have been less about sex, but rather repeated attempts to capture the love that he saw his grandparents -I believe- possess). In a way his persistence at finding this love is admirable, and who can’t relate to going into a new relationship star-eyed, willing to risk anything at the chance of true love despite personal history and past failures? De France’s ignorance of warning signs, her act of confrontation, and subsequent resentment are all such realistic, human responses to being in love with someone who is not reciprocating that love, and makes her character sympathetic, but also exposes the responsibility she shares for this fate, specifically her complicity in acting in accordance with irrational hope and fear. Baer’s response to her confrontation is equally as humane a depiction of how those who have fallen out of love subvert this feeling and remain complacent yet emotionally distant, waiting for their partner to address the situation. Ultimately both Baer and De France act, or don’t act, out of strong emotions ranging from fear to passion, and both came away as sympathetic. I was surprised that my empathy swayed towards Baer in the last act until the final shot, when De France shows all the insecurities of being romantically rejected via her coy mannerisms in what may be the most emotionally raw moment in the movie. It’s a perfect way to end the story by exploiting the real theme of the film, that the way love happens is nobody's fault, it’s just the game.
While Mouret has a lot to say about these serious humanist concerns, as usual the film is hilarious. Much like Love and Friendship, the olde English dialect and cultural norms are used creatively. I particularly loved
SpoilerShow
the ‘birthday present’ scene played as novel and ridiculous.

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#46 Post by domino harvey » Mon May 27, 2019 3:31 am

Great news: Fais-moi plaisir! is now streaming for free on Amazon Prime, under the title Please, Please Me! This is the best Mouret film yet to be available streaming for English-speaking audiences-- go watch!

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#47 Post by barryconvex » Fri Feb 07, 2020 3:45 am

Caprice

I was on the fence about this one until the moment when Mouret proved he had the courage to present his lead character (Clement) in a less than favorable light. After Clement has improbably won over his ideal woman, the actor Alicia Bardery (played by Virginie Efira) and moved in with her (we're even treated to the "we're in love and everything is going great" montage) the last thing you'd expect him to do is...exactly what he ends up doing. It's a ballsy and confounding choice: I'm rooting for the guy and I've been conditioned by dozens of Hollywood versions of this story to expect a zig but instead Mouret zags and creates an infinitely richer, more complex and satisfying character and film by doing so. There are several other moments when Mouret has seemingly painted himself into a corner of Hollywood cliche and each time he convincingly writes his way out of it. Not in a manner that's cute or clever or superior or contradictory, but in a way that shows he's thought of all the possibilities and chosen the most interesting path. A perfect example is the relationship between Clement's friend Thomas and Alicia. By not presenting Thomas as a rival (and having enough respect for his audience to allow his characters to be more than grotesque competitors for the princess' hand or impossibly beautiful women lazily dreaming of a kiss from Prince Charming) he has effectively banished all forms of jealousy from his universe. This caught me more off guard than anything else in the film and took me awhile to adjust to. But by the time our leading man openly ponders if his good friend might be a better match for the woman of his dreams than himself, I wanted to shake Mouret's hand and thank him for leading me into this brave new world. It's a great feat to effectively rewrite the rules to suit one's needs but to do so in an accessible and altogether non-experimental film like this one is especially admirable.

Mouret makes many smart decisions but none is more important than his choice to avoid romanticizing his characters. People are mistreated and behave selfishly, feelings are hurt and bad decisions are not in short supply but no one here is vindictive, possessive or any of the other usual hack screenwriting conceits we've been bludgeoned with over the years. One last observation: in the scene after he has reconciled with Alicia, Clement bursts out of his office and in a pique of unbridled joy slides down a bannister and breaks his leg. Mouret could've ended this scene with a closeup of Clement lying face up in the middle of a row of garbage cans and forgotten all about the leg. That would've been fine, a funny throw away moment before continuing onto the rest of the story. Instead he works the broken leg into the film. Showing Clement hobbling around in a cast for several scenes instead of going for the quick visual gag feels like the choice Chaplin or Tati would've made. It fits into the character and flow of the film and allows Mouret to display his talent for physical comedy.

These are deep waters here, deceptively so at first, but once acclimated to Mouret's environment the end result is as refreshing as any contemporary movie I've seen in the past ten years or so. And I haven't even mentioned the title character or about a dozen other brilliant moments.

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#48 Post by domino harvey » Fri Feb 07, 2020 4:13 am

Wonderful appreciation! I look forward to your thoughts on his other films, I think you’ll find them on your wavelength based on your response to this

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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#49 Post by therewillbeblus » Fri Feb 07, 2020 3:47 pm

barryconvex wrote:
Fri Feb 07, 2020 3:45 am
Caprice

There are several other moments when Mouret has seemingly painted himself into a corner of Hollywood cliche and each time he convincingly writes his way out of it. Not in a manner that's cute or clever or superior or contradictory, but in a way that shows he's thought of all the possibilities and chosen the most interesting path. A perfect example is the relationship between Clement's friend Thomas and Alicia. By not presenting Thomas as a rival (and having enough respect for his audience to allow his characters to be more than grotesque competitors for the princess' hand or impossibly beautiful women lazily dreaming of a kiss from Prince Charming) he has effectively banished all forms of jealousy from his universe. This caught me more off guard than anything else in the film and took me awhile to adjust to. But by the time our leading man openly ponders if his good friend might be a better match for the woman of his dreams than himself, I wanted to shake Mouret's hand and thank him for leading me into this brave new world. It's a great feat to effectively rewrite the rules to suit one's needs but to do so in an accessible and altogether non-experimental film like this one is especially admirable.
Nice thoughts barryconvex, I didn't feel so much that Mouret was choosing the most "interesting" path, but the most honest one in this bizarro world, as you describe well, where certain expectations and emotional impulses are balanced more evenly with logic by way of versatility in perspective. The film supposes, for me, a world in which things are mostly the same but a grey acceptance on the flexibility of values allows for different narratives to become preferred than our rigid ideas allow, proposing that our ideologies bleeding into human makeup even eliminate avenues that are possible inside and outside of the movies. By making the characters so likeable and the outlines of genre patterns familiar, Mouret provides a smooth access point in this otherwise subliminally challenging exercise. I think this is one of the best examples of how the French really adopt more of this expansive mindset as far as Western cultures go. They've always been stereotyped this way regarding their comprehension of sex and fidelity, but extending it into other areas of perspective and relinquishing prone and guarded defenses is so welcome and a reminder of the possibilities in day to day life that exist outside of our narrow peripheries.

I'm glad you enjoyed it! Aside from analysis, it's also one of the most charming and kind movies I've ever seen. I wonder what Bogdanovich would think of it if he had access! Now if only it would get a release with English subs before voting for the 2010s... is the iTunes version even subbed?

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domino harvey
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Re: Emmanuel Mouret

#50 Post by domino harvey » Fri Feb 07, 2020 3:51 pm

The circulating subbed HD copy of it came from... a previous incarnation of MyFrenchFilmFestival! I don't believe there is any currently available legal copy with subs, though I'm still weighing whether this is worth me licensing after a helpful discussion with a member in the industry on the financial realities of such an endeavor...

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