Cinema Wednesdays - Jonas Follonier
Olivia (Marina Foïs) is a well-known Parisian writer. She is paid to give a writing workshop in the South of France to young people with uncertain futures, young people on the move. Among them are people of different origins, reflecting today's France. Olivia's work is not going to go smoothly, as the group quickly begins to fall apart.
One of the participants, Antoine (Matthieu Lucci), attracts the suspicion of his classmates with his provocative attitude and «far-right» comments. It's undoubtedly also the jealousy he engenders: the texts he writes for the course have an accomplished form and interesting content in the eyes of the hostess, although perhaps too macabre. This tension between the young man, who is sensitive to the identity issues of his time, and the other students gives way to an ambiguous fascination that Olivia becomes infatuated with Antoine.
So we're dealing with two opposites: a cultural confrontation between native-born France and immigrant France, and a meeting between two social worlds: Olivia's affluent, bobo-oriented world, and the modest, provincial world of young people undergoing integration. While this scenario is interesting in its own right, Laurent Cantet's film veers all too soon into self-righteous ideology. Indeed, it does, L'Atelier has a political purpose. And what does it tell us? That terrorism has nothing to do with Islam. That Dieudonné and Zemmour are of the same species, the kind that leads to extremism. That radicalism is only violence for violence's sake, that it has no motive.
The summer landscapes of La Ciotat and the talent of actress Marina Foïs and young Matthieu Lucci are unfortunately counterbalanced by an inaudible moralizing. No one will soon be able to drink a drop of this cocktail of good feelings. Especially in art, where they have no place.
Write to the author : jonas.follonier@leregardlibre.com
Photo credit : critikat.com
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