BELLAMY

France, 2009, 110 minutes. Colour.
Gerard Depardieu, Clovis Cornillac, Jacques Gamblin, Marie Bunel, Vahina Giocante, Marie Matheron, Adrienne Pauley, Yves Verhoeven, Bruno Abraham- Kremer.
Directed by Claude Chabrol.

Bellamy was one of the last films directed by Claude Chabrol in a career that spanned fifty years. Part of the Nouvelle Vague in France in the 1950s, a strong film critic, he began making dramas in the late 1950s but, during the 1960s, made a series of films that are considered masterpieces of crime and portraits of French bourgeoisie. During the ensuing decades he made a great range of films, mainly crime thrillers.

This is a film about detection, although the audience knows what happened right from the beginning. Gerard Depardieu, in another fine performance, is an inspector on holidays who is a workaholic and can’t contain his curiosity when a case comes his way. His wife, played by Marie Bunel in a fine complementary role to Depardieu, wants to travel.

Jacques Gamblin plays a mysterious character who asks for Inspector Bellamy’s help. When his case is gradually revealed, the ambiguities of his character remain, especially when he finally gives himself up, is brought to trial, and is freed. Was he genuine or is this a continuation of his career of frauds?

There is a subplot concerning Bellamy’s younger half-brother, played with intensity by Clovis Cornillac. He comes to the house, makes demands on his brother, has been in prison, is unreliable, steals money from friends. However, his story parallels that of Gamblin’s victim, a homeless man who was in depression and who wanted to kill himself – something which the brother does at the end of the film, in a very similar manner.

With these complex strands, plus Bellamy’s continued interaction with Gamblin as well as his discussing all these matters with his wife, the film is a portrait of an interesting character, an interesting crime, a picture of life in a French provincial city, in this case Nimes.

Other characters include the wife of the fraudster, his girlfriend (who enters a relationship with the ineffectual local police inspector), and a sales attendant at a store who was a friend of the dead man. Her brother is a lawyer who appears at the end of the film in a court case – singing a song by Georges Brassan, mention of whom is made throughout the film and whose grave is near the place where the death of the vagrant man happened.

1. Claude Chabrol’s career? His crime films? His pictures of middle France, the bourgeoisie? A 21st century version? Of an older man?

2. The Nimes setting, the amphitheatre, the homes, the streets? The surrounding countryside? The sea? The opening sequence at the cemetery? The musical score?

3. The title, the focus on Paul Bellamy? Gerard Depardieu’s presence? His performance? Sympathetic character? His having written his memoirs, people seeing him as a celebrity? Being on holidays with his wife, her origins in Nimes? His restlessness? Yet not wanting to travel to Egypt as his wife did? The scenes of him with his wife, the easy domesticity? The love, the ordinary sequences, at home, the kitchen, the bedroom? Meals? Going out to their friends’, the dentist and his partner? The visit? The meal at their house? These details elaborating Bellamy’s character?

4. Emil Leulett in the garden? His stalking the house? Francoise’s puzzle? Bellamy and the phone call, the decision to go to see him? His explanation of his story? His different name? His cover? In hiding? The gradual explanation of his story? Bellamy’s visits? Pondering the ideas, discussing them with his wife?

5. Leulett’s back-story, his work for insurance, the frauds? Going on leave without pay? His relationship with his wife? With his mistress? The decision to commit the fraud? The girlfriend and her choosing Denis Leprince, the homeless man who resembled him? (And Gamblin playing this role as well?) The story of his relationship with his wife, Bellamy’s visit to her, her explanations, the remains of some love, the suddenness of her aneurysm attack and her death? The girlfriend, podiatry, her treating Bellamy and discussing things with him? The flashback to the dance sequences? Leulett and his taking the money, the death of Leprince – how much intended, getting him the clothes, putting him in the car, Leprince wanting to go to the cemetery for Brassan’s grave? The accident? Murder or not? The plastic surgery – and the difference between Leulett in the flashbacks and the dancing and in his discussions with Bellamy? His urging Bellamy to see his wife, his girlfriend? His being upset at the relationship with the inspector? Giving himself up? Going to court, his story, being freed?

6. The portrait of Francoise, a loving wife, married for many years, at ease with her husband? The dentist, the visit and the meal? The friendship with the dentist and his partner? Going to the house and enjoying the meal? Her antagonism towards Jacques? His intruding in the house? Her giving him Paul’s clothes? Paul returning – and initial suspicion, from Bellamy, from the audience? His apology? Francoise’s impeccable behaviour?

7. Jacques, the back-story of his relationship with Bellamy, Bellamy much older, their grandfather looking after them? Paul and his unreliability, in prison, drinking, stealing and gambling? Intrusion into the house, arrival at all hours? Asking for money, asking for the car? The walk with Paul, their memories of the past? The visit to the dentist and his partner, Jacques stealing their money, Francoise giving money back? The growing tension, his driving away, killing himself? Bellamy telling his wife about the past, his almost choking Jacques when they were children, the grandfather saving him? Carrying that burden all his life?

8. The vagrant man, his father the judge, his being dressed up, taken in the car – his suicide or not?

9. The girl at the store, her friendship with Bellamy, helping him with the shelves? His going to see her, her explanations about Denis? The young lawyer, her friendship, his taking on the case – his rhetorical performance, singing the Brassan song in his summation? His achievement and his success?

10. An episode in the life of Inspector Bellamy? Portrait of an interesting man, interesting case?