Ismael’s Ghosts, 2017.
Directed by Arnaud Desplechin.
Starring Matthieu Amalric, Marion Cotillard, Charlotte Gainsbourg, and Louis Garrel.
SYNOPSIS:
Film maker, Ismael, is immersed in making his latest movie, based on the life of his brother Ivan. And, after the disappearance of his partner 20 years ago, he’s found happiness with Sylvie. His first love, Carlotta, had been presumed dead but, out of the blue, she returns. It causes havoc, throwing him out of kilter, undermining his new relationship and putting the film on hold.
It’s a lip-smacking prospect. A cast including Marion Cotillard, Matthieu Amalric, Charlotte Gainsbourg and Louis Garrel, currently in cinemas as Jean Luc Godard in Redoubtable. And the director is multi award winner Arnaud Desplechin, who also wrote the script. So where did it all go wrong? It’s hard to know where to begin.
The basic idea is that Ismael (Amalric) has come to terms with the disappearance of his first love, Carlotta (Cotillard). Now in a happy relationship with Sylvie (Gainsbourg) and hard at work on his latest film, he finds his world turned upside down when Carlotta returns just as suddenly as she went away. There’s a nugget of a promising idea in there but, by the time you emerge out of the cinema some two hours later, it’s almost impossible to decide what it was all about. You’ve got a film within a film, so a paradise for movie fans, then? Not exactly, because the way it is handled is all over the magasin. The lengthy opening scene doesn’t bode well, with a group of men discussing somebody called Dedalus. He turns out to be a spy but, as their conversation continues, you’re already wondering what on earth this has to do with the film.
Truth is it’s part of the film-within-a-film concept, something that we keep returning to at Desplechin’s whim. And something that he regularly forgets about. There’s nothing in the way of parallel between the main narrative and the movie within in. In fact, the only connection is that it’s supposed to be based on Ismael’s brother’s life as a diplomat and his involvement in spy shenanigans.
The film meanders through Ismael’s involvement with Sylvie, its back story and the impact of Carlotta’s arrival, as well as the relationship between the two women). There’s also his descent into a form of breakdown which ends up with his producer being shot, a sub-plot involving Carlotta’s dad and so it goes until, when it reaches a dead end, it’s all tied up by a mini-monologue to camera by Gainsbourg. It is, in truth, a mess because it’s one of those frustrating films that doesn’t know what it wants to be. Carlotta’s return and its impact, by itself, would have made a decent, if not good, film: certainly one with structure and the potential for some meaty character roles. There could even have been an element of Martin Guerre in there as well, just to add some spice. The idea is thrown in at one point, and then thrown away just as quickly.
The film-within-a-film conceit doesn’t add anything, apart from lengthening the running time. Yet the relationship between the two brothers remains woefully sketchy, other than there obviously being no love lost. Curiously, the director describes the movie as being five films in one. Five? A bit greedy, n’est ce pas? Or just plain overly ambitious, when so many aspects are under-developed: concentrating on just one or two and exploring them properly would have been infinitely preferable.
As it stands, we have Amalric going right over the top, popping pills, glugging whisky and filling up his ash tray as the Ismael of the title. We’re treated to Marion Cotillard dancing to Bob Dylan’s It Ain’t Me Babe – she does her best, but it’s not really a dance tune. But she does, however, bring out the enigmatic side of her character rather nicely and there are moments where she feels ever so slightly ghostly. And Gainsbourg is the down to earth astrophysicist – yes, we all get the irony.
Ismael’s Ghosts is yet another film from last year’s Cannes line-up, but not one of its best. Untidy, rambling and generally tiresome, it’s just a matter of time before you start looking at your watch.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★★ / Movie: ★★
Freda Cooper. Follow me on Twitter.
