Two Days, One Night.

Brothers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne have always produced films that have a strong connection with their audiences, films like The Kid with a Bike (2011) or The Child (2005) and their latest film is no exception. Two Days, One Night (2014) is a movie about solidarity, industrial relations and the right to work. Surprisingly bearing in mind it’s a depressing wee story and one that doesn’t vary much from scene to scene, it’s a movie that hold’s your attention.  

 

Sandra's supportive husband Manu.

Sandra Bya (Marion Cotillard) is a wife and mother and has been suffering from depression and has been off work for some time. She is now ready to return to Solwal, a company that makes solar panels. In her absence her 16 workmates have been balloted by her boss who has given the staff the choose between allowing Sandra back or receiving a bonus of €1000 each and letting her go. The majority has voted for the bonus! Assisted by her workmate Juliette (Catherine Salee) and her supportive husband Manu (Fabrizio Rongione) she sets out over one weekend to try and persuade her remaining workmates to reverse the decision when her boss announces that he is allowing a new ballot is to take place on Monday morning. We follow Sandra as she painstakingly approaches each workmate and tries to change their minds over two days and one night. Most of them have their reasons for wanting to accept the monetary reward and thereby knowingly putting the working class Sandra and her family in dire financial straits’.

 

A future ballot is to take place.

The directors, who also wrote and produced the film, got their idea from various newspaper articles about similar situations when authoritarian bosses proposals challenged low paid workers solidarity. Since 2008 the recession has got deeper with in-work poverty becoming worse, and full time jobs becoming ever more scarce and harder to hold onto with zero hours contract becoming more widespread. It’s easy for workers like Sandra to loose faith and feel pretty worthless, scared of life and gradually loosing their confidence. It’s commendable to see directors like the Dardenne Brothers tackle problems of this austerity-ridden age and big stars like Cotillard supporting their endeavors. Even the film industry it self has recognized this with many plaudits and award nominations for this rather exceptional piece of work.

Rust and Bone.

Jacques Audiard is a French film director and writer that I grown to admire. First of his movies to come to my attention was Read My Lips (2001) which starred Vincent Cassel as an ex-con on parole who gets a job in an office environment and gradually forms a relationship with a hard of hearing secretary whose colleagues treat like dirt. Then The Beat that My Heart Skipped (2005), which tells the story of a 28-year-old real estate broker who, although involved with some very shady deals, has ambitions to become a concert pianist. It stars Romain Duris and went on to win a BAFTA for the Best Film not in the English Language. His best-known movie however is the award winning A Prophet (2009) a very gritty prison drama that brought Tahar Rahim to the attention of the cinema going public.

Stephanie takes the applause at Marineland.

Although ultra tough males have dominated Audiard’s previous films his latest movie not only includes the usual alpha male but a lead female character of immense strength and courage. Rust and Bone (2012) is very loosely based on a series of short stories of the same name (the title refers to the taste you get in your mouth when taking a hard punch) by Canadian author Craig Davidson. Set in Antibes a picturesque coastal resort between Cannes and Nice in Southeastern France of which we get to see a far grittier picture than normal.

Not the best way to earn your living!!

Ali (Matthias Schoenaerts) and his five-year-old son Sam, a boy he hardly knows, arrive on the Cote d’Azur to stay with his sister Anna and her husband. She puts them up in her garage and takes the wee lad under her wing. Ali, who was a boxer back in Belgium, gets a job as a bouncer at a nightclub where one evening he goes to the aid of Stephanie (Marion Coltillard), a pretty young women who he escorts home, leaving her his telephone number. Its when Stephanie is trying to come to terms with a terrible accident where she looses both her legs from the knees while training orca whales at the popular tourist attraction Marineland that she finally contacts Ali. He does not seem to be put of by her disabilities and starts a friendship that develops into a sexual relationship that literally puts Stephanie back on her ‘feet’. Meanwhile Ali begins to enjoy the monetary rewards of bare-knuckle fighting.

Ali and Stephanie become friends.... 

 Other than some over elaborate cinematography at times this is a well-made powerful movie, which has a love story that resonates right out from the cinema screen. It’s tough, gritty and touching with both Schoenaerts and Coltillard completely convincing as two people that have to face up to life in differing ways but in the process help each other cope with the hardships thrown at them. Marion Coltillard certainly deserves a mention in this seasons Award dispatches. While Audiard deserves a lot of credit for his brave attempt to show what it like to loose limbs, the CGI is totally believable. A film that definitely deserves your attention.

Facing up to life again.

Taxi Sequels.

Taxi 2 (2000).

Taxi ride in Paris!

This sequel to Taxi (1998) is again written and produced by Luc Besson but this time directed by Gerard Krawczyk. Taxi 2 (2000) follows the same formula as the first film, fantastic choreographed car chases, pile-ups and gun battles and uses the same main cast as before with Sami Naceri playing the Taxi driving speed freak Daniel, Marion Cotillard as his girl friend Lilly, Frederic Diefenthall as the police inspector Emilien, who has know passed his driving test on the 27^th attempt and of course we must not forget the lovely Petra played by Swedish model and actress Emma Wiklund. My favourite character is Commissaire Gilbert portrayed by Bernard Farcy

If anything this is even more fast and furious than the first movie and the opening scenes where Daniel is attempting to get a pregnant lady to the hospital before she gives birth in the back of his cab is really very funny. The story this time is about the visit of the Japanese Secretary of State for Defence who is a guest of the Marseille police, he’s there to inspect the city’s anti gang tactics and hopefully sign a contract that’s worth a lot of money to the French government. But low and behold a powerful team of Yakusa kidnaps the minister and Petra, minus her undergarments. Daniel and Emilien again have to join forces to implement a daring rescue.  A great French comedy that really makes you laugh.

The lovely Petra.

The only down side to this project was that a cameraman was killed while filming a car chase scene while his assistant suffered two broken legs. Luc Besson was the subject of an official investigation but cleared of all charges of compromising safety in an effort to cut costs. Veteran stunt coordinator Remy Julienne was given an 18 month suspended jail sentence and fined 13000 euro’s. The prosecutor accused Julienne of not taking all the necessary measures for the security of the stunt in question and notably to have neglected the speed calculations of the car and the length of the jump.

Taxi 3 (2003).

Taxi ride in the Alps!

And now for the sequel to Taxi 2 (2000) imaginatively called Taxi 3 (2003) again written and produced by Luc Besson and directed by Gerard Krawczyk. Not quite as frantic as Taxi 2 (2000) but still great fun, this time involving not only Marseille but the snow and ice of Switzerland!!! We have all the same characters played by the same cast; disappointingly we don’t see quite as much of Petra who along with Lilly is pregnant.  Although Commissaire Gilbert is featured more often than before.

The villainess.

Commissaire Gilbert.

The plot, never really important in these films, involves the Santa Claus Gang a group of Asian thieves led by Chinese actress Bai Ling (Dumplings 2004, The Hustle 2008) who outwit the police at ever turn until our intrepid super taxi driver Daniel comes to the rescue.

We are treated to the Tarantino type sound track again, coupled with a great James Bond opening credit, revolving number plates and a ski chase. A French speaking Sylvester Stallone (no really his voice is dubbed) has a cameo at the beginning of the film. Not as funny as Taxi 2 but I’m told still better than any of the American remakes.

Taxi 1998.

Supercharged Peugeot 406.

Like Subway (1985) before it, the French action/comedy written by Luc Besson and this time directed by Gerard Pires, Taxi (1998) has a great opening sequence, on this occasion it’s not a car chase it’s the fastest pizza delivery your ever see accompanied by a fantastic Tarantino type sound track! Daniel (Sami Naceri) is a pizza delivery boy who trades up his two wheels for four and becomes a taxi driver. With his supercharged Peugeot, which has to be seen to be believed, our driver can get you from A to B before you can say speeding fine. Eventually the police catch up with our ex-pizza boy and work out a deal that involves driving around a police inspector (Frederic Diefenthall) who to date has failed his driving test on numerous occasions, but needs to catch some German bank robbers that use high-speed Mercedes saloons to evade capture.

Sami Naceri and Marion Cotillard.

Our action takes place in Marseille, and what action we get, fantastic choreographed car chases, pile-ups and gun battles are the high points of this insane movie. Its great fun, obviously not to be taken seriously but has the added bonus of a 22 year old Marion Cotillard as Daniels girl friend Lilly for which she was nominated for a Cesar Award for Most Promising Actress. The critics panned the remake by the Americans: so only except the original.

Little White Lies

The Cast.

Ludo (Jean Dujardin) leaves a Parisian nightclub on his moped just as daybreaks; he has a sudden horrendous collision with a speeding truck that jumps the traffic lights. While he fights for his life in hospital his group of friends decide to go on their usual summer holidays to Cap Ferret, west of Bordeaux, leaving him totally on his own with his horrific injuries. The group consists of the rich business man and hotelier Max (Francois Cluzet) and his wife Veronique (Valerie Bonneton) who own the large holiday home which plays host each year to this group of so called friends including Marie (Marion Cotillard), Eric (Gilles Lellouche) and Antoine (Laurent Lafitte), husband and wife Vincent (Benoit Magimel) and Isobel (Pascale Arbillot) and there young son.

French poster.

This comedy-drama Little White Lies (2010) was written and directed by Guillaume Canet, best known for the 2006 award winning French thriller Tell No One and reveals secrets and hang-ups between a group of friends from the directors own generation who not only lie to each other but to themselves which is an attempt to cover the truth about their rather pitiful mundane lives. Their regular holidays together are a microcosm of their normal existence and Canet succeeds in making this group of obnoxious people into quite engaging characters. The musical soundtrack is an integral part of the movie helping to create strong visual images and helping to stir the imagination. A slightly overlong reunion movie similar in vain to Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train (1998) A Christmas Tale (2008) and The Barbarian Invasions (2003) not quite up to their high standard, but still worth a look all the same.