Change Your Image
Stephen Newton
Reviews
Être et avoir (2002)
Not at all what it seems
Etre et Avoir claims to be a genteel portrait of children in rural France enjoying the fruits of a simple way of life. A way of life that, like their youth, is on verge of extinction. In truth it is more than that; it is a film with a mission.
Shot in an apparently unobtrusive observational style, the film appears to show how life how it is. However, in reality it relies on the cuteness of the children to paint a picture of a fictional, highly idealised world.
We are bombarded with images of happy, oh so innocent youngsters thriving under the watchful eye of their wise old teacher and protector. We identify with the children and bring in our own worldly wise perspectives. Nostalgia (an emotion so very close to sadness) quickly engulfs us. This gushing sentimentalism - reinforced by the title To Be and To Have - is genuinely moving and very powerful.
Yet in truth, it is film made by cynics, who stage events to support their ideals. A family gathers round the dining room table to help a child with her maths, as if this is their way. Outside of the film, we learn that they never do this and this is a household where the television is always on. For the purpose of the film, of course, they appear to have no television! (We should always be prepared to test a text in this way; why should we take any artist at their word?)
This is not the inadvertent bias or fiction of a documentary maker whose own value system is so deeply ingrained they cannot keep it of their work. This is a carefully and deliberately crafted fiction.
The ideals that the filmmaker is so desperate to force upon us are ultra-traditionalist and ultra-conservative. This world abhors progress and harks back to a golden age that never was. It is reasonable to presume that lurking under the surface of Etre et Avoir is every bias and prejudice rightly associated with such thinking.
Talaye sorkh (2003)
Sad, but thoughtful, bungled heist Iranian style
A sad, but thoughtful, film in which the main protagonist struggles in vain to find his place in a complex and contradictory Iran. The bungled heist that both starts and ends the piece makes for a most pathetic cry for help.
Rosetta (1999)
Unremittingly dreary
Unremittingly dreary, Rosetta offers no relief in its exploration of a poverty stricken young girl's attempts to cope with her situation. The film offers not one glimmer of hope, but then Rosetta has none. Don't expect to see Tom Hanks in the US remake!
But what's interesting about comments on this site is that the Europeans seem to love it while the Americans hate it!