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Ma
Saison Preferee (1994/1996) (aka "My
Favorite Season")
(Viewed at "The Key" in Georgetown, D.C.).
Director Andre Techine seems to have watched many
Bergman films - as well as Woody Allen's "Bergmanesque"
works. His themes and style are quite similar. But Techine
doesn't have the striking style of the other directors.
His film is much more stilted and less emotionally impacting
than his peer's. In the end, it all seems a bit silly.
Catherine Deneuve plays a bored housewife who tolerates
the tension between the others in her family - for a
while, at least. Her mother (Marthe Villalonga), brother,
husband (Jean-Pierre Bouvier), adopted son and natural
daughter all seem to have devised an intricate network
of liking and disliking each other. A girlfriend (for
both the son and daughter) is thrown in for sub-text
as well.
The film wants to explore the odd relationship between
Deneuve and her slightly estranged brother (Daniel Autevil).
This is complicated when their mother, a rather cold
fish to Deneuve who showers Autevil with attention,
becomes to ill to care for herself. Eventually, the
film wants us to see the sibling's relationship as somewhat
incestuous, but the film has neither the courage or
the insight to go into that direction. It only hints
at this with the children of Deneuve. Instead the film
fails by trying to revolve on the themes of children
who have attempted to be adults becoming child-like
again. It's complexity in this arena is so strained,
that one simply cannot connect all of the pieces themselves.
Techine doesn't help much either.
Eventually, "Ma Saison Preferee" will try anything
to make it's story unique: Premonitions, dream sequences
and dramatic interludes are all used to heighten the
story but none of it really helps. As the film evolves,
it becomes less and less interesting and more and more
silly. When the film finally winds down to it's close,
it has it's main character's discussing their favorite
season (the English translation of the title). We are
supposed to find meaning in the fact that Deneuve and
her brother, now somehow reunited and more at ease within
their lives, both like summer. It makes no sense.
Made in 1994 for French audiences, the film was subtitled
in English and released in America in 1996. One wonders
why.
Review written in 1996
Report
Card
Script:
F
Acting: B+
Cinematography\Lighting: B
Special Effects\Make Up: B
Music:
C
Final
Grade: D-
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