Un taxi mauve (1977)
Directed by Yves Boisset

Film Review

The two kinds of film that director Yves Boisset is best known for are gritty modern thrillers (Folle à tuer, Le Juge Fayard dit Le Shériff, Canicule) and provocative political dramas (L'Attentat, R.A.S.).   Made at almost the exact midpoint of the director's career, Un taxi mauve represents a surprising departure for Boisset into psychological drama and ranks as one of his most original and satisfying films.  Adapted from an acclaimed novel of the same title by Michel Déon, the film is effectively a chamber piece (in the Ingmar Bergman mould) that offers very little in the way of plot but grabs the attention with its exploration of the ambiguous relationships between an odd assortment of individuals stuck together in a picturesque backwater.  The breathtaking Irish landscape doesn't just provide an eye-catching backdrop, it actually plays a crucial part in the drama, stressing the physical and emotional isolation of the main characters as they come to terms with their various personal crises.  It also imbues the film with an eerie poetry and an aching sense of melancholia.

A commercially succesful auteur, Yves Boisset never had much difficulty attracting a top-notch cast for his films, but for Un taxi mauve he pulled off his greatest casting coup.  Philippe Noiret and Charlotte Rampling would have been more than enough star power to sell the film on both sides on the Atlantic, but Boisset also managed to rope in two even bigger acting legends, in the shape of Peter Ustinov and Fred Astaire (as well as a more than capable supporting cast that includes a beguiling Agostina Belli).  On the face of it, it sounds like an utterly weird ensemble but, believe it or not, the casting turns out to be perfect.  Rampling has never looked more sensually alluring and is ideally suited for the role of the femme dangereuse, the spark that ignites the dormant passions in her midst.  Noiret sports an unaccustomed fragility in one of his more sympathetic and down-to-Earth roles, against which Ustinov's enthusiastic portrayal of a mysterious Russian exile attains almost monstrous proportions.  Meanwhile, zipping about nonchalantly in the background is old Twinkle Toes himself, looking so at home in a picture postcard Irish village that you'd think he had spent his entire life there.

As it turns out, the real star of the film is none of the aforementioned A-listers but the stunning location, photographed with an almost divine artistry by Tonino Delli Colli, one of Italy's top cinematographers.   It isn't just the raw beauty of the Irish landscape that Colli manages to capture in every exquisitely crafted shot, he also evokes its Celtic mystique, bringing a distinctive romanticism to the film that breathes the essence of Ireland.  It is a shame the wondrous lyricism of Colli's location photography isn't matched by the quality of the screenplay, which is banal and anaemic in comparison, and not helped by Déon's tendency for turgid prose.  It isn't just the taxi that's purple.

Another disappointment is the film's somewhat caricatured portrayal of the Irish.  With every cliché you'd care to think of readily on tap, the pub scenes are a chore to sit through, and not too far removed from what you might find in a typical British sitcom of the 1970s - a nice cocktail of blatant national stereotyping and casual homophobia.  Galling as these lapses of good taste are, they are thankfully minor blots on an otherwise impeccable landscape.  For a filmmaker who is more at home in heavily plotted genre films, Un taxi mauve is a welcome detour off the beaten track and reveals a more human side to Boisset than we would ever discern from his more prosaic thrillers.  The Emerald Isle, Philippe Noiret, Charlotte Rampling, Peter Ustinov and Fred Astaire in a purple taxi - what a strange but irresistible combination.

Film Synopsis

After the death of his son, Philippe Marchal, a French writer, seeks the seclusion of a small coastal village in Ireland.  Here, he befriends Jerry, the son of a wealthy businessman who is in exile after disgracing himself in his native America.  Both men are interested in Anne, the apparently mute daughter of Taubelman, an eccentric Russian who seems to know everyone but is strangely reticent about his own past.  Another colourful figure is Dr Scully, a retired doctor who drives about in a quaint purple taxi.  The arrival of Jerry's socialite sister Sharon is about to upset the strained equilibrium in this close-knit community...