ELLES
France, 2012, 100 minutes, Colour.
Juliette Binoche, Anais Demoustier, Julia Kulig.
Directed by Malgorzata Szumowska
Elles has a Polish perspective on its themes, from writer-director, Malgorzata Szumowska, as well as a French perspective with the story set in Paris. It also has a strongly female point of view with director, star and themes.
Juliette Binoche plays a reporter for Elle Magazine, engaged in research on an article about young French students who work as call girls to supplement their income. (This was a theme in John Duigan’s 2012 Australian film, Careless Love.) The two young women, one French, one Polish, become very frank in their discussions with the journalist, Anne, and their stories are visualized quite explicitly for the audience.
There is more, however, than the elaborating of the two stories, the revealing of the characters of the two young women who become much more involved in their work, sensual gratification as well as the possibilities of a more comfortable, even luxurious life. We are focused on Anne, a day in her life as she is finishing her feature article.
Her life at home is quite ordinary, a teenage son with resentment problems, critical of the coldness in his parents’ marriage, a younger boy preoccupied with video games. The couple are expecting his boss and wife to dinner that day. Anne cleans, cooks, is concerned about her son. But, all through the day, there are flashbacks to the meetings with the two young women, her growing involvement with them, something of an obsession, but also letting her imagination work, compensating the arid sexuality of her own marriage.
Towards the end, the film indulges in some fantasy at the dinner table. But, then, the next morning, everything is back to normal – but we are not sure how real this is or whether it is a challenge to what the French call bourgeois life.
With films and topics like this, there is the question of how real is the treatment, how prurient. And, depending on the experience of the audiences, whether this is a world we have seen in other films or whether there is something new with insights. Perhaps it is best to say that the world of the call girl students has been treated in other films but the strength of this one is Juliette Binoche’s complex portrait of Anne and the effect of her interviews on her own life.
1. The title? The French magazine? Reporters for the magazine, feature writers? The reference to the girls interviewed? The anonymity for the prostitutes?
2. The perspective: Polish, French, the views of young women, of the reporter? The characters, their values?
3. Audience interest? Reporting and the effect on an ordinary life? The world of call girls, the world of young students? The effect of this work on their lives and values?
4. The framework of the screenplay: Anne’s day and the continual return to the details of her day? The flashbacks, Anne’s memories and their effect on her?
5. Anne, the performance of Juliette Binoche? Age, her work, reporting, the phone calls, the meetings with the young women, the various interviews, the different locations, getting to know the girls, listening to them, imagining what they were describing (and the audience seeing this and sharing it)? A female view contrasting with the male view? The home location, the different rooms? Contrasting with the locations for meeting the women? The meals with them, the sharing of intimate details? Hiding the personal stories and their effect on Anne?
6. Anne up all night? Why the lie to Patrick? Florent and his questions about breakfast? Stephane and his video games? Patrick on the phone, her asking him to buy the wine, sending everyone off to school and work? The indication of tensions and the marriage? A day of preparation for the meal, seeing her clean and wash, her concern about Florent, his return, the questions, his attitude towards his mother, the tensions and the marriage? Work in the kitchen, cooking, burning her hand, cutting her finger the sexual tension, her lying down, masturbation, Stephane and his new game? Patrick and his not being close to her, her sensual approach, his refusal? The meal, her dress, the guests, important for Patrick and his work? The chatter, her imagining the clients at the meal, the naked man with the guitar? Her leaving, Patrick searching?
7. Her return, the next morning, ordinary, normal breakfast? Affirming or challenging the way of life?
8. Charlotte, calling herself Lola? The appointment, in the park, her explanation about herself, the visit to her parents, sex with her boyfriend? The issue of money and comfort? Her studies? Enjoying the sensual experiences? Her range of clients, bored husbands, men wanting to be excited? Her response, the visuals, the frankness of the scenes? Her regretting the lies?
9. Alycia, initially hostile, the Polish background, her arrival, hopes for study? Meeting the young man, the sexual encounter, sharing Polish and Arabic insults? A range of clients? The month and her getting the apartment, luxuries? Her behaviour, the effect on her? Her mother’s visit, her mother and the truth, the standing in the rain together?
10. The range of clients, rough, sensual, the man with the guitar, the vain young man…? The reappearance at Anne’s dinner?
11. A film of insight? Or back on familiar ground? The reporter and her stage of life, her marriage, her own sexual identity? The effect of the experience on her? Taking the audience to another world?
