Volume 125: Une belle course
The Voice of Energy Vol. 125
Greetings, loyal subscribers. I hope you are doing well on this, for me, cold January day.
Question for you: I don't know how easy this would be to do, but I'm thinking of changing the name of the newsletter to be something more appropriately film-based, since that's what this publication is now. The Voice of Energy made perfect sense as a music-related newsletter, taken as it was from the title of a Kraftwerk song, but what do you think? A good idea? Not necessary? Too little, too late? Let me know.
This week, a review of a lovely French film being released in the U.S. and a recommendation of a short subject by America's greatest living director.
Une belle course (2022, dir. Christian Carion)
If you are even a casual viewer of cinema, you know where Une belle course is ultimately heading. Charles (Dany Boon), a gruff taxi driver in Paris, picks up Madeleine (Line Renaud), a woman heading to her final destination: an old folk's home in the heart of Paris. What should be a quick crosstown trip turns into an all-day affair as the two share their personal histories and Madeleine dispenses kernels of wisdom gleaned from her 92 years on this planet and Charles helps his new friend enjoy one last day of relative freedom.
By this early stage, you've likely already made up your mind whether to bother with this movie or not. And I don't know that anything I type from this point on might change your mind. All I do know is that it landed precisely where I knew it would and I still found myself in tears at the end.
In full disclosure, that likely has everything to do with the circumstances of my life (two parents in their 70s both facing the inevitable with as much grace and humor as they can muster) and how I related to Charles' circumstances as a gig worker scraping by in an increasingly expensive city. And, living in time where the news cycle is constantly delivering fresh horrors and worries, a little cinematic comfort food felt good to sup on for 90 minutes.
This warm bath of a film does come with some moments of icy shock. As the story dips into flashbacks, Madeleine (played in her younger days by Alice Isaaz) reveals the difficulties and horrors of her past. Her father was killed by the Nazis. A brief fling with an American GI left her pregnant. And after marrying the abusive Matt (Elie Kaempfen), she retaliates in a particularly gruesome fashion — an assault that lands her in prison for 15 years.
To the credit of Carion and co-screenwriter Cyril Gely, they balance the tone switches capably. The more challenging moments of Madeleine's life are explicated and portrayed matter-of-factly and don't upset the relative calm of the rest of the film, even when they come with the pained wails of a man being scarred by a welding torch.
Underpinning all of this are the filmmakers' subtle commentaries on how Paris seems quick to elide its past and modernize the landscape without much forethought. The placard honoring the murder of Madeleine's father is almost hidden on a side street. And the charming apartments where she and her family once lived has been replaced by a sleek office building. As with all movies, how you respond to those details — and the story as a whole — will likely come down to what you bring with you into the theater or your living room. Put another way, when it comes to Une belle course — or Driving Madeleine as it is being marketed in the States — your mileage may vary.
Une belle course opens today in New York and Los Angeles and expands to theaters around the U.S. starting on January 19.
FTA Pick of the Week
Our new regular feature — a recommendation of a movie to watch that is hiding below the fold on one of the major streaming services. In other words: fuck the algorithm.
New York Stories (1989, dir. Martin Scorsese / Francis Ford Coppola / Woody Allen)
With Martin Scorsese's brilliant adaptation of Killers of the Flower Moon arriving on Apple TV+ this week, it feels like as good a time as any to dip into the director's previous work. One fascinating place to start would be the short subject he made as part of a triptych of films packaged and released as New York Stories in 1989. Scorsese's entry, Life Lessons, is a nice companion piece to his unsettling black comedy After Hours as it delves into the Soho art scene through the thick lenses of abstract painter Lionel Dobie (a rarely better Nick Nolte) struggling to finish a new work in advance of an upcoming exhibition. His concerns aren't helped by the return of Paulette (Rosanna Arquette), a former assistant and lover forced to move back in with Dobie and navigate his moods, jealousies, and obsessions. Written by the great Richard Price, the story is a perfect evocation of the artistic temperament and the power imbalance often present in the relationships between artists and their so-called muses. Joining Life Lessons in this anthology are a middling trifle from Scorsese's friend Francis Ford Coppola and a sharply funny fable from Woody Allen. The good news for those folks wanting to skip over those other two segments is that Life Lessons is given the lead slot in New York Stories, so find it without awkwardly fast forwarding and then move on to watch one of Scorsese's other films available for streaming such as After Hours (Tubi, the Roku Channel) or Silence (Paramount+).
New York Stories is available to stream on Hoopla.
Thanks as always for reading my little missives every week. It means the world. I'll be back next week with more reviews. Not sure exactly what just yet, but it'll be something!
Ceasefire now.
Artwork for this week's edition is from The Foreign In Us, an exhibition of the work of Hayv Kahraman that opens today at the Moody Center For the Arts in Houston, Texas.
This newsletter was written on the unceded land where once stood the traditional village sites of the Multnomah, Wasco, Cowlitz, Kathlamet, Clackamas, Bands of Chinook, Tualatin, Kalapuya, Molalla, and many other tribes who made their homes along the Columbia River creating communities and summer encampments to harvest and use the plentiful natural resources of the area.