Beau travail (1998)
Country: FR
Technical: col 93m
Director: Claire Denis
Cast: Denis Lavant, Michel Subor (reprising a role he played in Godard's Le Petit Soldat), Grégoire Colin
Synopsis:
Present day Djibouti: at a Foreign Legion outpost adjutant Galoup has the attention of his admired commandant until a new recruit arrives who threatens to supplant him.
Review:
A transposition of Melville's Billy Budd onto dry land, the film is a succession of images, flashing back and forth sometimes confusingly between then and the civvy street to which our inscrutable narrator has been returned, and depicting men in training, men performing routine menial tasks, and the African setting complete with bemused native women. The pace is slow but the effect mesmerisingly beautiful at times. Little is explained about the characters, who do not interact in a conventional cinematic way; everything is communicated by Galoup's diary extracts and one or two brief exchanges. Music is used to convey the mood: Britten for the vortex of repression under the desert sun, Coronia's The Rhythm of the Night for Galoup's ultimate release. (Subtext: Galoup is in love with Forestier, who spurns him for Sentain. Galoup responds by removing Sentain from view, then by provoking him to insubordination so that he can be punished. Galoup is ditched and feels remorse.)
Country: FR
Technical: col 93m
Director: Claire Denis
Cast: Denis Lavant, Michel Subor (reprising a role he played in Godard's Le Petit Soldat), Grégoire Colin
Synopsis:
Present day Djibouti: at a Foreign Legion outpost adjutant Galoup has the attention of his admired commandant until a new recruit arrives who threatens to supplant him.
Review:
A transposition of Melville's Billy Budd onto dry land, the film is a succession of images, flashing back and forth sometimes confusingly between then and the civvy street to which our inscrutable narrator has been returned, and depicting men in training, men performing routine menial tasks, and the African setting complete with bemused native women. The pace is slow but the effect mesmerisingly beautiful at times. Little is explained about the characters, who do not interact in a conventional cinematic way; everything is communicated by Galoup's diary extracts and one or two brief exchanges. Music is used to convey the mood: Britten for the vortex of repression under the desert sun, Coronia's The Rhythm of the Night for Galoup's ultimate release. (Subtext: Galoup is in love with Forestier, who spurns him for Sentain. Galoup responds by removing Sentain from view, then by provoking him to insubordination so that he can be punished. Galoup is ditched and feels remorse.)
Country: FR
Technical: col 93m
Director: Claire Denis
Cast: Denis Lavant, Michel Subor (reprising a role he played in Godard's Le Petit Soldat), Grégoire Colin
Synopsis:
Present day Djibouti: at a Foreign Legion outpost adjutant Galoup has the attention of his admired commandant until a new recruit arrives who threatens to supplant him.
Review:
A transposition of Melville's Billy Budd onto dry land, the film is a succession of images, flashing back and forth sometimes confusingly between then and the civvy street to which our inscrutable narrator has been returned, and depicting men in training, men performing routine menial tasks, and the African setting complete with bemused native women. The pace is slow but the effect mesmerisingly beautiful at times. Little is explained about the characters, who do not interact in a conventional cinematic way; everything is communicated by Galoup's diary extracts and one or two brief exchanges. Music is used to convey the mood: Britten for the vortex of repression under the desert sun, Coronia's The Rhythm of the Night for Galoup's ultimate release. (Subtext: Galoup is in love with Forestier, who spurns him for Sentain. Galoup responds by removing Sentain from view, then by provoking him to insubordination so that he can be punished. Galoup is ditched and feels remorse.)