TWO LIONS IN THE SUN

France, 1980,110 minutes, Colour.
Jean- Francois Stevenin, Jean- Pierre Sentier, Michel Robin.
Directed by Claude Faraldo.

Written and directed by Claude Faraldo, writer-director of popular offbeat anarchic films like Bott and Themroc. This time he takes two middle-aged men and shows them leaving family and living together. It is not so much the emphasis on homosexuality as the relationship between the two men and their reaction against conventional life. In an offbeat style, with touches of black humour, they decide to turn to a life of crime to support themselves after opting out. Their entanglements involve their families an well as a kidnap attempt. They also attempt suicide but botch the job. They want to free themselves but are caught in the mesh of contemporary pressures. The film is sentimental in many ways in its affection for its heroes. However, it has the blend of authenticity as well as stylised exaggeration which are the hallmark of French satiric comedies.

1. The significance of the title and its irony? The reality and symbolism of the lions?

2. The particularly Gallic tone of the film? The atmosphere of France? The details of the French way of life? The characters within the French situation? Holidays, the road, restaurants? The business world, the professional world? Rules and regulations, marriage and divorce? Relationships and homosexuality? Freedom, opting out? Life and death?

3. The conventional introduction to the couple on holidays? Their enjoyment of the holidays, its failure? Their coming home? Bickering? The crash? The friendship with the attorney and the meal with him? Their response to him and the calculation of their plot?

4. Paul and Reno ? the film's delineation of their character? Their age, work, background? Their sense of fun, poetry? Family and divorce? The daughter ambitious to become an actress? Their declaring themselves lonely, oppressed? The quality of their relationship - the homosexual perspective? The contrast of each man in himself with the other? With the attorney?

5. The black comedy in their decision to perform the kidnap? The comedy on the life of crime - blackmail. hustling, kidnaps, loans? The ironic comments on conscience and what is right?

6. The kidnap and its irony? The loan and the smooth talk and success of the venture?

7. The daughter and her life style? Ambitions? Mireille and the alimony? The apartment?

8. The opting out of the pressurised rat race? The carefree way of life? The friendship with Babette? Sexuality, money? The light touch to this holiday way of life?

9. The build-up to the suicide? Preparations? Botching the attempt? Laughter and irony?

10. A satiric and telling portrait of the ordinary person in the busy world? Sensitivity to feelings and values? The portrait of society and its morals? Double standards? Individuals within this context? The harshness of life and death?