5.0 out of 5 stars
Smashing cautionary tale!, April 11, 2010
This review is from: In All Innocence (DVD)
In films, as in life, things aren't that complicated. When things start rolling, it usually follows suit and ends well. Whereas when everything gets complicated right from the start...
By the way the gripping story is told, how nothing is in vain, and the perfect music that accompanies everything, let alone the 80ish photography, you can tell this film is just everything it was meant to be.
Carole Bouquet's regard, right from the start, knowing and yet forgiving, is worth many cinema tickets. If you think she's just a gelid pretty face like Catherine Deneuve, watch this film. Real classy. Virginie Ledoyen is very natural as a nice, alluring and totally manipulative temptress. So beauty you can hardly blame poor Maitre Lanvin for believing her, for thinking he's really saving somebody out of dejection and being thankful to destiny for "all he had got, with the aid of chance".
J.P. Lorit, from the underdog "Seule", has clear intentions right from the start. Would have liked a bit more of "character development" for him. Lanvin is perfectly cast! He's done great comedy like Camping and dramedy "Viens chez moi...", this shows he's good at more serious stuff.
Mar Sodupe's wardrobe and hairdo deserve the best for looking the worst :)! She looks like the "very ugly female characters" from any Almodóvar film. Which proves that "good loyal friends come in all shapes & sizes" :). Denis Podalydès is from the Comédie Française, and it shows. He did small successes like "Figaro", in here he is as expressive as anybody can be with his small role of looser turned "defender of true causes". I found Guillaume Canet's character likeable and believable in his stupidity (who didn't have an obnoxious high school bully like him?). But, this is the only criticism I can make to the film... isn't him a bit too powerful? Hey, couldn't a big time lawyer like M. Farnese got rid of him, buy him, send some thugs, put him in jail for being a petty dealer? I don't know, if even Martorel (the loosing lawyer) knew...
One always has a favourite moment, mine is Bouquet's speech to Martorel when she defends him, after everything everybody knows, with a speech that should be required reading/ viewing for anybody interested in justice and morality, let alone practicing lawyers. And the best line also belongs to her, when they cross at the tribunals: "No, (I didn't get what I wanted.) I just wished you were dead" and she leaves exuding class, like few mortals could do, let alone top models half her age. I agree with IMDB reviewer "jintz" that Ledoyen's character is rather one-dimensional.
Watch it, you'll have fun and see for yourself how dangerous can a sexy kitten be, how stupid do they make us. (Transform the sentence if you are a woman, the rules apply equally for any "Vincent". There are many "Cécile Maudets" in our lives. It's in us to realize they are well, basically incapable of feeling.
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