The virtues of a wicked wit

PostED ON 15 OCTOBER 2022

This documentary covers only partially Étienne Chatiliez's filmography, focusing on his four biggest successes, from Life Is a Long Quiet River (1988) to Tanguy (2001), movies that garnered over 15 million viewers, at a time when cinema attendance was even more flagging than today.

The merit of this work is that it gives the filmmaker a voice, and through images, demonstrates what made these films so compelling and memorable. Chatiliez is a child of advertising, having directed many joyful and colourful commercials during an era, as he points out, when advertising was still considered a lighthearted and creative art, influencing the latest trends.

© DR

Having shifted to directing thanks to his ad producer, Charles Gassot, who had converted to the cinema, Chatiliez continued to make fine use of his amateur sociologist's eye. His subject? The family. Rich family, poor family (Life Is a Long Quiet River and its reflection on nature vs nurture), the place of elders within the family unit (Auntie Danielle), the corporate family experienced as a prison (Happiness Is in the Field), or the difficulty of leaving the family cocoon (Tanguy). Étienne Chatiliez is rightly insistent on his wicked wit, his taste for the politically incorrect, explaining, for example, that Tanguy was born from an idea he considers unspeakable: "All parents in the world hate their children ten seconds a day." Is society no longer capable of accepting inconvenient truths? Or has the filmmaker's inspiration waned over time? Pending questions…

Aurélien Ferenczi

Étienne Chatiliez – Juste une mise au point by Sébastien Labadie (2022, 1h02, VFSTA)
Villa Lumière Sat. 15 2:30pm