Eulogy (2004)

Eulogy: Directed by Michael Clancy. With Zooey Deschanel, Micole Mercurio, Lucy Boyle, Tania Gunadi. A black comedy that follows three generations of a family, who come together for the funeral of the patriarch – unveiling a litany of family secrets and covert relationships.

“Thereu0026#39;s really nothing to say about u0026quot;Laissez-passeru0026quot; that Bertrand Tavernier didnu0026#39;t put in his movie, for its statements about history and art is loud, clear, and beautifully exposed in his sincere and passionate motion picture.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe tone of the movie, however, immediately repulsed me, with its over-theatrical aspect, where all the u0026quot;realisticu0026quot; details of the time area of the film (post-WWII occupation in France) are artificially underline (from the way people talks to the objects…). This gives a fake aspect to the all beginning of the movie, and is particularly striking in the first scene, that presents the characters and the situations through a vaudevilleu0026#39;s scene, in which all a hostel shut up to allow a famous actress to met her lover, the well-known writer Jean Aurenche, while thinking sheu0026#39;s unnoticed. But this tone, that underlines the artificiality of the scene, is only annoying for a little while, and is almost absolutely forgotten when the real story begins with the apparition of Devaire.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAnother subject of doubt is the blur of the narration, which only confronts two different stories, without even organize a meeting between the two main characters. But this impression is also erased as soon as you understand that Devaire and Aurenche only embodies two parallels idea of resistance : Devaire, the assistant director, is all in act, while Aurenche, the movie writer, resists with words. The interest of the movie comes by the confrontation and the parallelism of the two situations, as in u0026quot;The Godfather IIu0026quot;, where the actions of the son only takes a meaning trough the ones his father done years ago. In u0026quot;Laissez-passeru0026quot;, Devaire goes to England while Aurenche has to justified himself in front of a Vichy employee.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe movie is also enjoyable thanks to its optimism. The vision of art and of Cinema it deals with, underlines that aspect. It appears as a need, an urge that allows people to really live, not to accept the world, but to modified the way people look at it. Itu0026#39;s also through art that resistance could express itself (to the German at the time of the movie, but its meaning is far more general). The artifices of the costumes, of the metaphors can allow artists to show a masked reality.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eItu0026#39;s true that the movie sometimes looks like a TV movie – with its inexplicable fade to black, its need to present a u0026quot;well doneu0026quot; reconstitution, etc. – but this is at the end not so annoying, for the goal of Tavernier is to guide us the easiest way, with conventional codes and an aesthetic that wonu0026#39;t chock anybody, thru his historical and cinematographic passions. Of course, none of this is really new or inventive, but still, it really is passionate.”