...Comme elle respire (1998)
Directed by Pierre Salvadori

Film Review

For ...Comme elle respire, his third feature, director Pierre Salvadori brings together the talented pair Marie Trintignant and Guillaume Depardieu for the third time, building on the success of Cible émouvante (1993) and Les Apprentis (1995). Through it may wildly fluctuate between farce and drama, the film still manages to keep at least one foot on the ground and avoids lunging into silly or sentimental excess.

The film could have worked perfectly well either as a comedy (Salvadori's original intention) or a straight drama.  It is reported that Salvadori changed his mind and introduced some dramatic elements into the film when he realised the tragic dimension of the mythomania disorder. Danièle Dubroux (who had previously made a film dealing with mental disorder, Border Line (1992)), lent her talents to the screenplay - she would later be credited with the idea for Salvadori's subsequent comedy Après vous... (2003).

The film's schizophrenic mood is reflected in the roles of the two lead characters.  Depardieu is there mainly to entertain - which he does with consummate ease (well, he has had plenty of experience playing this kind of luckless chump).  Trintingant plays essentially a straight role, giving a performance which is believable and poignant - the comedic counterpart to a not too dissimilar part she had played in Claude Chabrol's Betty (1992). As well as being the perfect foil for Depardieu's boyish exploits, she succeeds in giving her character, a compulsive liar, a tragic dimension.  The chalk and cheese pairing of Trintingant and Depardieu works very well and is the main reason for watching this likeable film.

Film Synopsis

Jeanne is a mythomaniac, lying constantly to anyone she meets.  She arrives in Paris and gets work as a waitress, where she meets an old woman, Madeleine, who recruits her as a housekeeper.  This news does not please Antoine, a young con artist who has arranged to take Madeleine out to dinner so that a friend of his can burgle her house.  Later, when Jeanne tells Antoine that she herself comes from an immensely wealthy family, the young crook decides to pretend to fall in love with her. Realising that he may have struck gold, Antoine asks two of his associates to kidnap Jeanne, to demand a ransom from her parents.  In truth, Jeanne's parents are relatively poor...