139 - A Christmas Tale, 2008, France. Dir. Arnaud Desplechin.

Friday, May 17, 2017

139 - A Christmas Tale, 2008, France. Dir. Arnaud Desplechin.

Family drama.

Begin with a great house.

With beautiful wallpaper, drapes, fabrics, furniture, light fixtures, artwork, music, food, drink, and of course bookshelves filled with great books.

Fill it with three generations.

And their compiled history.

Their family past.  Their individual memories.  Their collective unconscious.

Their native talents.  Their former hopes.  Their life choices.  Their disappointments.

Physical ailments.  The memory of the dead brother.  The life struggle of the mother.

Sibling rivalry.  A love quadrangle.  Financial challenges.  Lawsuits.  Mental illness.  Alcohol.

Bring in the spouses and the girlfriend.

Their struggles.  Their heartaches.  Their longings.  Their fears.

Their love and their hurt.

Their faith.

Roubaix.  A small city in northern France.

Abel and Junon Vuillard.  The patriarch and matriarch.

They had a boy.  Joseph.  He had leukemia.  They had another child to try to find a bone marrow donor.

Their son died.  At age 6.

His memory steers them.

Now they are grandparents.

With three grown children.  A daughter and two sons.

And a cousin.

And a son-in-law.  A daughter-in-law.  And a girlfriend.

And the friend of Abel's mother.  Rousaimee.

And grandchildren.  Basile and Baptiste.  Do you know our names?  Why do you keep getting it wrong?

And Paul.  16.  Mentally ill.

Now Junon has leukemia.  She tells them.  She needs a bone marrow donor.  Come for Christmas.

Elizabeth is married to Claude.  They have Paul.

Henri is dating Fauina.  She is Jewish.  And kind.

He faced bankruptcy.  Elizabeth paid off his debts.  Demanding he never set foot in her house again.

Henri drinks.

Ivan is married to Sylvia.  Henri once dated her.  So did Simon.  The cousin.  Raised in the home.

Sylvia loved Simon.

The boys decided Ivan was the right one to marry her.

She discovers this collusion now.

She is not pleased.

They get together for Christmas.  For Grandma.

At Grandpa and Grandma's house.

The family home.

Arnaud Desplechin traces the complex web of family ties in two hours and thirty-two minutes.

Catherine Deneuve plays the matriarch Junon.

The story is beautifully filmed.

And it feels honest.

He just places it all out there for us to see.

Just like our own families.

The messiness of our own lives.