"That's a nice-a donut."

Sunday, April 09, 2006

5x2 (2005)

5x2 begins in a small office as we witness the final divorce proceedings of Gilles (Stephane Freiss) and Marion (Valeria Bruni-Tedechi) and ends as they swim together in the sea on the first
day of their relationship. From Francois Ozon, director of several distinguished films such as 8 Women and Swimming Pool, it is a non-linear movie that moves backwards to tell the story of their relationship in five short tales. It may remind you of Nolan's Memento or Noe's Irreversible in structure and style. But it's quite different in its own right as Ozon shows us the bitterness and melancholy of a love that has died, before ultimately showing us a relationship that seemed so good. How did this happen?

We move from the divorce proceedings (and a subsequent tryst in a hotel room), to a (strained but) revealing dinner party a year or two before, and then the birth of their son a couple years before that, their wedding night, and finally scenes from a resort paradise where they meet and fall in love. A very minor and seemingly insignificant subplot involves Marion's parents - their relationship is also struggling and perhaps serves as a mirror for Marion and Gilles. By the end of the story (the beginning of the movie), Gilles wonders if the dad has moved out yet, while the parents are clearly still in love at the couple's wedding.

Neither of the main characters are terribly likeable. Early on it is Gilles who seems to be more at "fault" and then we see some more negative aspects of Marion. This isn't the actors fault, but probably just a simple consequence of telling a divorce story like this. In fact, the acting is great overall. These foreign actors, many of whom most of us have never heard of and will probably never see again, are all first-rate and give very deep performances. Bruni-Tedechi and Freiss are very solid, and seem to provide just the right expressions and body signals that are needed, at all the right moments.

The problem with the comparisons to Memento or Irreversible though is that those took place over a much shorter time period. For the most part, they could just have easily been done in linear fashion and most of the relevant details of the characters and situations would have been known to the viewer. 5x2 takes places over a number of years, and with just five tales being told, much is left out. That's not say that we should always be handfed all the answers - and goodness knows Hollywood loves to do that - but give us something. It's often good to leave the viewer to make their own deductions and theories about filling in any blanks in the story; here there is so much space between each story that too much is left blank. This is supposed to be a study and decomposition in the dissolution of a marriage, and yet we only have the vaguest and slightest clues about what really brought them down.

Some of the clues we do get are very intriguing though. Such as how Gilles, after Marion calls him to say that there were problems and they will be inducing her into labor, tells his secretary to hold his calls; he is busy working. Why does he do that? Or how Marion, on their wedding night, ventures outside after he has gone to sleep and ends up flirting with a strange man. Why does she do that?

Technically 5x2 is a very impressive movie, smartly edited with good photography and no wasted shots. It's just a bit on the disappointing side as an end product - the tastes that we get of the relationship are just too brief for us to really hold opinions or, ultimately, to care.

The Verdict: C.

Michael Bentley 9:32 AM

"That's a nice-a donut."

Sunday, April 09, 2006

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