GABRIELLE Reviewed by Harvey S. Karten
First Take (IFC)
Grade: B
Directed by: Patrice Chereau
Written By: Patrice Chereau, Anne-Louise Trividic
Cast: Isabelle Huppert, Pascar Greggory, Claudia Coli, Thierry
Hancisse, Chantal Neuwirth
Screened at: IFC Center, NYC, 7/16/06
Opens: July 15, 2006 Who wants to be the trophy wife of a multi-millionaire? I
wouldn't mind and neither did Ivanna, but the title figure in
Patrice Chereau's talky but reasonably absorbing and Bergman-
esque melodrama must have thought that ten years' trophy
spouse-hood simply does not work anymore. Since the part of
Gabrielle is played by Isabelle Hupert–arguably France's finest
actress and capable of playing particularly angry roles–you've
got to believe that her husband, Jean Hervey (Pascal
Greggory), needed glasses. If he wanted someone both
cultured and hot, he'd have gone for Charlize Theron, but
unfortunately Charlize was not available in France, and certainly
not in 1912–for which we today are grateful. Patrice Chereau, ever the inventive directeur, adapts a colorful
but dry100-page short story by Joseph Conrad, a writer who in
"The Return" posits that a bad marriage is the true heart of
darkness. This chamber piece, essentially a dialogue–no, make
that a series of monologues by two people and therefore with
good potential to play in New York's Promenade Theater–is
talky even by French standards. Why so? Probably because in
Europe just before the start of the war to end all wars, Victorian
restraint was de rigeuer. This convention, strictly followed
particularly in haute bourgeois circles, makes the husband's one
climactic outburst a coup-de-theatre, as though James Bond
were talking about how to make the best latte or the most
exciting sex-on-the-beach, then suddenly whips out his gun and
shoots up the works. Evoking the writing style of both Joseph Conrad and, in this
case, particularly that of Henry James, Chereau, using his own
script with Anne-Louise Trividic's input, takes us into the
claustrophobic Paris mansion of Gabrielle and Jean Hervey.
They are two people who have no children, not even a shih-tzu
for pete's sake, but whose every move is assisted by some of
the half-dozen or so servants who intrusively hover over them.
When Madame gets ready for bed, she has one servant collect
her earrings while another removes layer upon layer of clothing.
When they arise in the morning, presumably another servant
brushes their teeth. Is this the way to live? Gabrielle must have
thought so, trading her looks and her cultivation for a man's
ability to provide her with the comfort. When photographer Eric
Gautier hones in on the baroque statues in one chamber, he is
doubtless eliciting the view that the passion of the couple is not
unlike that of the marmoreal icons. One day, Gabrielle falls prey to a cacoethes: she leaves a note
for M. Hervey (love that name). It's quitting time for her. She's
out of there, just like Henrik Ibsen's Nora, with someone who is
not as rich in francs but makes up for his lesser financial stature
by offering her a life with emotion. But she reneges just hours
later and returns to Jean. How else would Chereau be able to
afford us in the audience a host of soliloquies? For visual
variety, Chereau shifts from color to black-and-white. He uses
freeze-frames with the glee of a twenty-year-old in NYU's film
department and honors Bert Brecht and Jean-Luc Godard by
occasionally splashing huge titles across the screen. Ultimately,
it falls to Jean, who is nominally a publisher, to decide what to
do (outside of firing his editor. You'll see why). "Gabrielle," then, is the tale of a dysfunctional family which may
not please devotees of Joel Zwick's "My Big Fat Greek
Wedding" but works nicely on an audience that craves somber,
affecting stories of woe among the super-rich. Makes us sorta
feel we're happier after all, being able to wear jeans and T-shirts
to dinner and listen to Led Zeppelin rather than segments of
dissonant operas. Not Rated. 90 minutes 2006 by Harvey Karten
harveycritic@cs.com Member: NY Film Critics Online | 
