"The Truth" (2019 release from France; 106 min.) brings the story of Fabienne and her forty-something daughter Lumir and her family. As the movie opens, we see Fabienne being interviewed at her house in Paris. She is a past winner of 2 Cezannes (the French Oscars) and is about to start a new film. And oh, she also has a new memoir out called "La Verite" ("The Truth"). Shortly thereafter Lumir and her husband Hank and their young daughter Charlotte arrive at Fabienne's house. Lumir reminds Fabienne that she didn't keep her promise to send an advance copy of the memoir's manuscript to her (she lives in New York; Fabienne blames the mail). When reading the memoir, Lumir finds one fabrication after another. She confronts her mom, but Fabienne brushes her off: "My memories, my book." At this point we are less than 15 min. into the film but to tell you more of the plot would spoil your viewing experience, you'll just have to see for yourself how it all plays out.
Couple of comments: this is the latest film from Japanese writer-director Hirokazu Kore-eda (he won the 2018 Cannes Festival Palm d'Or for "Shoplifters"). Here he really goes outside his comfort zone, working for the first time on a non-Japanese spoken film. As big a challenge as that had to be form him (since he doesn't speak French himself), it only brings out the best of him and his all-star cast. Catherine Deneuve shines as the cranky ol' actress who seemingly always must have the last word (or does she?). Ethan Hawk is underused as Hank. But the real star here is surely Juliette Binoche, who is absolutely brilliant as the frustrated daughter who ended up going to New York to escape the never-ending shadow of her mom the star actress. A special kudos as well to the perfectly bilingual little girl playing Charlotte, jumping between French and English without as much as a single literary "faux pas". There are many other aspects of the movie that make this a delight to see and enjoy, but I don't want to spoil anything accidentally. In the end, just sit back and watch these giants of French cinema (Deneuve, Binoche) go at it. True acting royalty is what these ladies are.
The trailer of "The Truth" was playing in theaters in early March and then of course the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, bring the movie industry to a screeching halt. Now 4 months later, my local art-house theater has cautiously reopened (with strict adherence to all COVID-19 measures, including social distancing and wearing a mask). "The Truth" opened this past weekend. The Sunday early evening screening where I saw this at was attended so-so (5 people in total, including myself), which which was just fine but you gotta wonder how financially viable it is for theaters to operate under thee conditions. Meanwhile, if you are in the mood for a top-notch foreign film, I'd readily suggest you check this out, be it in the theater, on VOD (most likely), or eventually on DVD/Blu-ray, and draw your own conclusion.
Couple of comments: this is the latest film from Japanese writer-director Hirokazu Kore-eda (he won the 2018 Cannes Festival Palm d'Or for "Shoplifters"). Here he really goes outside his comfort zone, working for the first time on a non-Japanese spoken film. As big a challenge as that had to be form him (since he doesn't speak French himself), it only brings out the best of him and his all-star cast. Catherine Deneuve shines as the cranky ol' actress who seemingly always must have the last word (or does she?). Ethan Hawk is underused as Hank. But the real star here is surely Juliette Binoche, who is absolutely brilliant as the frustrated daughter who ended up going to New York to escape the never-ending shadow of her mom the star actress. A special kudos as well to the perfectly bilingual little girl playing Charlotte, jumping between French and English without as much as a single literary "faux pas". There are many other aspects of the movie that make this a delight to see and enjoy, but I don't want to spoil anything accidentally. In the end, just sit back and watch these giants of French cinema (Deneuve, Binoche) go at it. True acting royalty is what these ladies are.
The trailer of "The Truth" was playing in theaters in early March and then of course the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, bring the movie industry to a screeching halt. Now 4 months later, my local art-house theater has cautiously reopened (with strict adherence to all COVID-19 measures, including social distancing and wearing a mask). "The Truth" opened this past weekend. The Sunday early evening screening where I saw this at was attended so-so (5 people in total, including myself), which which was just fine but you gotta wonder how financially viable it is for theaters to operate under thee conditions. Meanwhile, if you are in the mood for a top-notch foreign film, I'd readily suggest you check this out, be it in the theater, on VOD (most likely), or eventually on DVD/Blu-ray, and draw your own conclusion.