1966 Winner, A Man and a Woman

A Man and a Woman

Director:  Claude Lelouch

Distributed by:  United Artists

Released:  July 1966

Country:  France

On the surface, A Man and a Woman is a film as simple as its title.  You pretty much get what you are expecting:  A romance, a touch of comedy, some suspense as to whether the man and woman will be a couple in the end—the details are what may make the movie interesting.  It’s kind of like when you watch one of those trailers that pretty much tells you the whole story, and you wonder whether you should bother seeing the film—well, if there car crashes in the trailer and you are into car crashes, you probably don’t really care if the trailer gives too much away.  If you see the title A Man and a Woman and think that’s for you, you’ll probably like it.  If you just got dumped or divorced or hate romance films, you probably should forget about it.

Jean-Louis and Anne

So the details:  Two kids are at a boarding school:  A boy and a girl.  Presumably, some day they’ll grow into a man and a woman.  Which would be a good idea for a sequel, but that’s not what this movie is about.  The boy has a father who is a widower, and the girl’s mother is a widow.  The father, Jean-Louis, is a race car driver whose wife couldn’t take the stress of being married to a man in such a dangerous profession.  The mother is Anne, whose husband was a stunt man who couldn't take the danger of being in such a dangerous profession.  And well, the reason he couldn’t take the danger of being in such a dangerous profession is that one time he got killed do a stunt.

So like any good romance, Jean-Louis and Anne meet almost accidentally, in their case because of their kids; they have a feeling-out period; they admit to themselves and to each other their attraction; they have a feeling-out period (which today would get them their PG-13 rating); then an obstacle pops up and you’ll just have to watch it find out whether the homme and the femme end up together.

Jean-Louis (Trintignant) and Anne in Amour

Having seen Amour, 2012’s Best Foreign Film, about an elderly couple who endure the woman’s serious illness, I thought of A Man and Woman as almost a prequel to that later movie.  It’s as if after Jean-Louis and Anne work out their issues, they live a long life together until Anne has a stroke.  In fact, in both films, the Woman character is named “Anne.”  The Man character is played by the same actor, Jean-Louis Trintignant, who also had an important role in 1969’s Best Foreign Film, Z.  Both Amour and A Man and a Woman are simple films about the roles each person has in the relationship.

There is a realness to Jean-Louis and Anne's romance.  Jean-Louis is frequently unsure about what to do and about what Anne wants him to do.  One humorous scene has him talking to himself about how to react to her congratulatory note after he has won a race.  Anne is the more unsure one about how she feels about things in relation to her past relationship.  The question is whether she will let go of her dead stuntman in order to be happy with Jean-Louis.  You can probably guess if she will.  But that’s okay.

No car crashes in this one

The title:  Un Homme et une Femme. More famous than the movie, perhaps, is the theme,  written by Francis Lai, who is sort of France’s answer to Henry Mancini, having also written the easy listening classic “Theme from Love Story."

The Culture:  The feel of this film is a shift in times, from the more conservative 1950’s into the more sexually permissive 60’s.  The outdoor scenes are in color and the interiors are shot in black-and-white, adding to the sense of transition.  Men wear suits on dates and both feel free to smoke while dining at a restaurant with their kids.  It’s sort of a cross between Mad Men and Flight of the Concords' “Foux du Fafa.” 

Agenda danger:  This one is as apolitical as it gets—a nice escape.

Best Picture that year:  A Man for All Seasons

Rating:  A pleasant enough romance.  Both l’homme and la femme are likeable enough, and of course, the natural impulse is to hope they get together to become un couple.  Again, a mere reading of the title will tell you whether you’ll like it or not.  I prefer more complicated stories generally, but somehow knowing there probably wouldn’t be too many surprises didn’t take away from the romance for me.  And if you are into car crashes, you just might be in luck.

2018 Winner, A Fantastic Woman

A Fantastic Woman

Director:  Sebastián Lelio

Distributed by:  Sony Pictures Classics

Released:  Februay 2017

Country:  Chile

Imagine a woman, in her late 20’s or so, a waitress and an aspiring opera singer.  She is dating a rather wealthy man in his early 60’s, and has recently moved into his rather luxurious apartment.  The man is divorced or separated from his wife, with whom he has a nine-year-old daughter.  He left her for the younger woman, apparently unable or unwilling to keep his urges for the younger woman in check, thinking he is in love.  One day, the man falls suddenly ill after sex with the younger woman and dies in the hospital.  After his death, the woman still has the keys to the man’s car and apartment and takes her sweet time giving both of them up to her late lover’s family.  She insists on attending the dead man’s services in spite of the demand by the family that she stay away to spare their feelings, including that of the nine-year-old.  The question:  Is this a Fantastic Woman?

Ah, but I left out one smallest of small details—the woman, quite recently, went by the name of Daniel.  The Fantastic Woman is, you see, a transsexual named Marina.  And Marina seems nice enough, a person with insecurities and talents and the need for love, just like anyone else.  But because she was a man, she gets treated impolitely, even harshly, by a number of people she encounters after the death of her boyfriend, Orlando.

Marina and Old Orlando

For one thing, when she brings him to the hospital, the staff don’t consider her family and therefore don’t allow her into his room.  While waiting for Marina to take him to the hospital, Orlando takes a tumble down a flight of stairs, resulting in some bruising and a contusion on his head.  Marina is questioned by police about it and about the fact that she inexplicably ran away from the hospital for a time after bringing Orlando there; they wrongly suspect there may have been domestic abuse.  During questioning they check Marina’s ID and take pictures of Marina’s entire body to check for bruises--as someone puts it, she "hasn't had the operation yet."  Orlando’s ex-wife isn’t too big a fan either.  She tells Marina that when Orlando left her, she told him that Marina was a perversion.  She calls Marina a “chimera,” which seems to cut Marina deeply.  I had to look up the definition--"an illusion or fabrication of the mind."  Ouch?

From what I could gather, the point of the film was to elicit sympathy for Marina and antipathy for those who mistreat Marina.  The plot was rather thin and the last 30 minutes or so seemed to drag on endlessly with no real resolution.  Basically, it seems what makes Marina a fantastic woman is that she is a victim.

The films is very skillfully and aesthetically photographed, a real pleasure to look at.  Santiago, Chile, comes off looking bright, sophisticated, and colorful.  The acting was fine, though I found Daniella Vega, who plays Marina, to be a bit one-note, not really moving beyond a sort of dull melancholy.  Overall, this wasn’t a bad movie, really, just an overpraised one.  Again, had the main character not been transgendered/transexual, I would have still found Marina to be hard to like.  But while the Academy, the critics, and whoever wrote the film wanted the viewer to find Marina to be “fantastic,” I did not.

Some guy stuck on an elevator with Marina and Orlando's wife: AWKWARD!

The Title:   Una mujer fantastic.  We live in a time in which one has to be careful when one discusses any LGBTQ in a manner that is anything but fully accepting.  In many circles, it is frowned upon, even illegal, to not accept a person’s gender as something other than what they were born as.  That said, I found it interesting that the protagonist in this film is labeled “fantastic,” a word which can be defined as “based on fantasy, not real.”  I suppose the writer of the film, which very much is sympathetic to Marina, may have been trying to be ironic, or witty, or something.

The culture:  First Best Foreign Film winner from Chile, it comes off as a slightly less than conservative country, with vestiges of its Catholic heritage intact. 

Agenda danger:  Frankly, I had a bit of a headache from being hit over the head with the message of the film, which was that those who don’t accept trans-sexuality are numerous and despicable.  In one scene, a group of thugs terrorize Marina with slurs and wrap her head in scotch tape.  But even the people who seem to be polite to Marina hold an obvious dislike for who she is or has chosen to be.

Scene from The Shape of Water

Best Picture that year:  The Shape of Water.  Hoo boy, it seems Oscar had a real agenda on its (his? her?) mind this year.  This Guillermo del Toro film tells the story of a woman who has a hankering for a fish.  And I don’t mean she enjoys a good tuna fish sandwich every now and again; I mean she enjoys getting boned by a fish man, obviously not a fillet.  That story, while more “fantastic” than A Fantastic Woman, is even more blatant in its message that all relationships of a sexual nature are equally acceptable.  Even if one agrees with this concept wholeheartedly, it's hard not to feel preached to in watching these two films.

Rating:  I didn’t find this film fantastic by any definition.  Mostly, it was a bore.