«Farewell to the night, farewell to life

Cinema Wednesdays - Jonas Follonier

In Farewell to the night, Catherine Deneuve plays a French woman from the southwest who discovers that her grandson is about to go and fight jihad in Syria. A poignant film by André Téchiné.

Muriel is delighted to be reunited with her grandson Alex, who was orphaned in an accident that killed his mother. It's been a long time since the young man came to visit his grandmother. Muriel looks after horses in the magnificent setting of south-west France. France, however, is not enough to stir the hearts of some young people born in the country, who dream of a totally different life. Out of distress, certainly. Out of stupidity too, no doubt. And manipulation, of course.

André Téchiné's latest work follows Muriel as she gradually discovers that her grandson has lied to her - he's not going to Canada, as he claims, but to the Middle East. There's no marshmallow in the script, no overly tragic music: the case is dealt with right down to the bone. This is enough, oh so enough. It's enough to keep the viewer on his toes, for the realities of conversion, radicalization and jihad are intolerably, unbearably topical. And yet it's there.

That said, it's a shame that the plot isn't more tightly knit. After all, this is a real-life drama, but above all, it's fiction. The cinematic experience would have been even more intense if we had discovered young Alex's radicalization at the same time as Muriel's character, in internal focus. It's just an idea I've come up with without any directing experience. But it's a hunch I wanted to mention.

Muriel's dilemma, formulated by the daily newspaper Le Temps - «let Alex go to the end of his drift or save his life by betraying him, by denouncing him?» - seems to me to be anything but a dilemma. For there to be a dilemma, both options must be unacceptable. Now, if we look coldly at an individual who is about to join the ranks of a terrorist organization, and even more so if we love him, we will inevitably want to make the choice to reason with him and, if we can't, to call in the police. No dilemma. But tragic, yes.

Write to the author: jonas.follonier@leregardlibre.com

Photo credit: © Xenix Films