Angèle et Tony (2011)
Directed by Alix Delaporte

Film Review

One of the French film highlights of 2011 has to be this unpretentious slice of life drama which, with its biting realist edge and authentically drawn characters, gives the Dardenne brothers (the masters of naturalistic cinema) a good run for their money. Staying well clear of the mania for stylisation that is currently plaguing auteur cinema (and providing a poor substitute for content), first-time director Alix Delaporte concentrates on the essentials and delivers a film of immense power, refreshingly modest in its approach - a simple tale of a seemingly ill-matched couple falling in love.  Whilst the script could have benefited from a little judicious pruning to expunge the occasional longueur and unnecessary plot digression (such as the preoccupation with the hero's dead father), Angèle et Tony is an impressive debut feature that can hardly fail to engage its audience with its unsentimental account of two deeply flawed individuals being redeemed by the power of love.

It is tempting to compare this film with Robert Guédiguian's acclaimed Marius et Jeannette (1997).  Both films adopt a rigorously unfussy naturalistic approach and are set in a working class milieu, in towns suffering from severe industrial decline. However, Delaporte's film has a somewhat harder edge than Guédiguian's, there is less humour and it takes a while before we can warm to the principal characters.  When we first meet Angèle and Tony, we have to take them at face value - she is obviously a cynically motivated go-getter, he is a social inadequate who would rather wallow in his solitary misanthropy.  For the first half of the film, these characters act as we expect them to, but that changes at the midpoint, when their true natures begin to assert themselves and events take a far more humane turn than we might have expected.  This transformation would have been a hard sell had it not been for the depth and conviction that the leads Clotilde Hesme and Grégory Gadebois bring to their performances (both reveived Césars for their work on this film in 2012).  With minimal dialogue, the two actors have to express their character's inner feelings mainly by visual cues and meaningful pauses, and they do so with extraordinary eloquence.  Indeed, so richly nuanced and true to life are these performances that the spectator cannot help experiencing the full force of the emotional tsunami which washes over the main protagonists as Eros works his magic.

The film's setting - Port-en-Bessin, Calvados at the height of the recent credit crunch - provides a suitably sombre backdrop for the main drama.  As stressed-out fisherman on the brink of financial ruin clash with riot police, the air is charged with pent-up anger and a growing sense of hopelessness, something which aggravates Tony's feelings of alienation and his family's antipathy towards Angèle.  It is not the most fertile ground for a budding romance and when Angèle and Tony first meet (looking more like wild animals than people) we are naturally sceptical over where their romance will lead.  Yet, just as a rose may blossom amongst wild thistles, so something wonderful sprouts from this improbable rencontre.  The bleakness of the fractured world that surrounds Angèle and Tony takes on a softer hue as they awaken in each other deeper feelings and set themselves free from past traumas and present woes.  This is a heartwarming fairytale carved from the roughest granite, and no one who watches it can fail to be enchanted by its simplicity and humanity.

Film Synopsis

Angèle is a young woman who moves to a Normandy fishing town with the intention of starting a new life.  For the past two years, she has been in prison and her one ambition now is to win back custody of her son, who is presently in the care of her deceased husband's parents.  For this to happen, she must be able to show social services that she can provide a stable home - and for this she needs to have a life partner she can rely on to support her.  One day, she meets Tony, a laconic fisherman.  Seeing that Tony is strongly attracted to her, Angèle encourages him, realising that he could be just the man she is looking for to help her win back her son.  Almost straight away Tony realises that something is amiss.  Why should such an attractive woman be so willing to give herself to him?   Fearing that Angèle may be playing some kind of game, the fisherman holds back, but gradually these two bruised individuals develop a close and sincere relationship...