Ridicule
by Patrice Leconte
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DVD details
Actor: Bernard Giraudeau, Charles Berling, Fanny Ardant, Jean Rochefort, Judith Godr?cheDirector: Patrice Leconte
Brand: Miramax
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: French (Original Language); English (Subtitled)
Format: Color, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 103 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2004-01-13
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Miramax
DVD Reviews of Ridicule
DVD Review: Nero fiddles ...
Summary: 3 Stars
Patrice Leconte, who directed, came to Hollywood in 1996 fully expecting to win the Oscar for best foreign film with "Ridicule" but lost to a bit of fluff from the Czech Republic titled "Kolya." It was a shocking experience, he says in an interview. He and his wife ducked all the parties after the ceremony was over and returned to France on the next plane; walking around Paris, he says he felt he had a sticker on his forehead that read "loser." Did he get a raw deal in Hollywood?
Yes and no.
Yes because this is an interesting and entertaining film, far better than the ones Leconte competed against that year, well done and well acted. Judith Godreche (she's on the DVD cover) and Fanny Ardant are beautiful women who create memorable characters, while Berling and Rochefort prove why they are among France's best actors. The story itself is spot on (as the Brits say) in showing a French version of "Nero fiddled while Rome burned" -- in this case, how Louis XVI, who ascended to the throne in the middle of financial crisis, wasted time with trivia (verbal fisticuff competitions at court) when he should have been taking care of business, which led to a revolution, and the rest is history.
No because this sort of topic, despite the new angle, doesn't realy warm the hearts of Academy members. And speaking of members, it doesn't help matters to start the story with a shot of a fellow whipping out his ... member (no kidding) and urinating on a dying old man who had insulted him years ago. M. Leconte, with all due respect, this sort of thing makes you look like a bonehead in Hollywood (no pun intended). That scene should have been taken out. I'm guessing it turned people off and led to the warm and fuzzy "Kolya" getting the nod instead. More importantly, unless viewers know French well enough to get the point of the humor and the play on words, all that will be lost in translation. I am certain virtually no one in Hollywood knows (or cares) what alexandrine meter is and how hard it is to write poetry in French that follows such a pattern--the examples in the film are minor league stuff anyway; for the real thing, read Baudelaire. The verbal fisticuffs give the film a high degree of arrogance and condescension that does not go over well at all in Tinseltown.
Leconte does much better when he stays away from politics, e.g. "The Hairdresser's Husband" and "The Perfume of Yvonne." Check those out.
DVD Review: Beautiful
Summary: 5 Stars
beautiful everything, from the costumes to the dialogue to the scenery...a bit along the same vein as the count of monte cristo. an interesting study of the pettiness of humansDVD Review: Great for teaching Pre-Revolution France!
Summary: 5 Stars
I use this movie each year in my Western Civ class to "set the stage" for our discussion of the French Revolution. The decadence and excessive luxury of the nobility contrasts starkly with the poverty of the peasants. Not to mention it has a great storyline that the students really enjoy! (And I don't mind watching it over and over)DVD Review: Gross out warning
Summary: 2 Stars
Skip chapter one if you do not wish to see in explicit detail one man urinating on another. I found this to be extremely disgusting. You have been warned. I am surprised none of the other reviewers mentioned this. DVD Review: The best French film you'll ever see!
Summary: 5 Stars
Rarely do we witness an impeccable work of Art. Social issues duly addressed, it also bemuses us, and shows mean and altruistic motives combined in every person, noble or wicked. It is true frivolity doesn't come off very well in this film, but I find the contrast between l'ing?nieur and la cour satisfying. I won't dance in our modern "cours" without having second thoughts from now on...
I love Jean Rochefort's roles, this one seems hand picked for him. Intelligence, restraint, frivolity and pragmatism alla Rousseau form this character. I'd love to have a guide in life like him!
Judith Godr?che's Mathilde de Bellegarde is fine. Probably too perfect, too much avant garde for the little education a woman was afforded at that time. But well, this and the fact that both father and daughter are "brilliant but poor" makes me wonder if this superb film does indeed have some elements of a feuilleton, of a pop novel. Like Cinderella, Lagardere and all its Hollywood variations, like, just to name one example, "Mona Lisa Smile". Mathilde said the cutting phrase I most liked of this film when observed that our hero started to like the corridors of power a bit for its own sake, mistaking his wit for his destiny. I wonder why Judith hasn't appeared on more quality films. Had her part been played by a lesser actress it would have brought the film to oblivion.
Madame de Blayac is just perfect. Beautiful, cunning, devoid of feelings. L'Abb? de l'Ep?e (Serpent) is extremely well thought of. De Bellegarde's words: "when he speaks, it's already too late" proved to be just too accurate. For some reason, the relationships between the two "Marquises" is at times like those middlebrow US films of boxers, from Rocky to "Million dollar baby". But I don't want to show a demeaning side of my favourite film, so I'll keep to the bright side :).
Music is, yes, PERFECT if you like the baroque. So is photography! The foggy duel with "L'Officier Duel", aerial views of "le marais" and some small moments, like the scene of the palace's flowers resembling it to a "The cure" song (an aspect S. Coppola's Marie Antoinette understood very well: the "modernity" of classic European culture). Any fool can film beauty at Versailles and Vaux-le-Vicomte. It takes a Leconte to show them under a new fresh light, "like if we had never seen them before".
As usual, Berling is fine. Some actors are born with "the gift"; it's obvious he's one of the chosen ones. Yes, this film is similar to "Dangerous Liaisons", but I find Ridicule is far superior for having likable characters and a human story to tell besides the "fireworks".
The storyboard is obviously perfect. C. O. DeRiemer in Amazon, "Terrell-4" at IMDb said something funny, in the spirit of the film, probably a good ending for this humble review. (On F. Ardant): "A man would be a fool not to want to bed Ardant, and even more a fool to trust her".
Enjoy!
PS: It's true that, as this reviewer writes, good command of French is in order if you want to follow this film. It would be like drowning in a marais.
No subtitle could do the job, and maybe only in French does detached verbal swordplay appear "refined" :).
Description of Ridicule
Nominated for an Academy Award(R) (Best Foreign Language Film, 1996) and honored by critics as one of the year's 10 best motion pictures, RIDICULE is an exceptionally entertaining tale of passion and deceit! In a desperate quest to save his hometown, a young man quickly learns that a sharp wit is the key to open any door in the Versailles court of Louis XVI! But his mission is complicated when he finds himself locked in a dangerous triangle with two very seductive ladies: a sophisticated older woman who can help him ... and an innocent young beauty with nothing to offer but her love! Wickedly funny humor and outstanding performances highlight this must-see triumph!In Patrice Leconte's cool, precise moral comedy Ridicule, the corrupt, sycophantic court of King Louis XVI is invaded by a provincial nobleman, Ponceludon de Malavoy (Charles Berling), who with the help of his own sharp tongue, the coaching of the retired courtier Marquis de Bellegarde (Jean Rochefort), and the love of the Marquis's beautiful, nature-loving daughter (Judith Godr?che) hopes to win funds for his project to drain the fever-infested swamps of his homeland. But first he has to get by the cunning, sexually manipulative Madame de Blayac (Fanny Ardant, imperious and superb) and her waspish, priestly ally, the Abbot de Vilecourt (Bernard Giraudeau).
As shaped by screenwriter R?mi Waterhouse, Ridicule is a kind of dashing verbal swashbuckler in which duels aren't fought with swords, but with the equally fatal weapon of words--rapier wit in its most literal sense. Laconte directs with an appealing elegance and a scathing sobriety as he unfolds a fable that could just as easily take place in a Wall Street boardroom, a Park Avenue executive suite, or a Hollywood commissary. --Dave Kehr
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