Léa Seydoux sits directly opposite Emmanuel Macron, the French president who lent his acting skills for an afternoon for the rock-solid opening scene of France (2021). The darkly comic drama revolves around Seydoux’s character France de Meurs, a star journalist for the largest news channel and a national celebrity who falls from her pedestal.
France is the new project of filmmaker and absurdist Bruno Dumont, who previously brought Jeanne d’Arc (2019) and P’tit Quinquin (2014) to our screens. In the film we follow journalist France and her successful career. She presents the most watched program, makes heroic reports in war zones, is also just a mother and always looks fantastic in the meantime. During press conferences she demands all the attention with her appearance and other journalists barely speak, and on the street everyone wants to have their picture taken with her.
Everything in scene
France is aware of her image and, together with her fanatical assistant, does everything she can to preserve it and polish it even further. She is not reluctant to stage her most dramatic scenes and feel free to let the rebels and war victims do an interview twice in order to capture the right images in which she herself is of course excellent. Seydoux plays this part absolutely insanely. She is charming and endearing, but also dramatic and annoying. France de Meurs is a good, complete character with the most beautiful movie tears in the world.
Everything is going well for France except for her relationship and nothing seems to stand in the way of her rising star, until she is involved in a minor accident. It’s her fault that the young man she hit is in the hospital, and all the media is jumping on it. This shocks her, but she does everything she can to restore her reputation as best she can. The fact that other people are now writing about her and that she is no longer in control, touches something in her. She loses all her confidence and withdraws for a while, but nothing seems to really help.
Polished truth
Dumont’s new film is a critical look at how French and perhaps all contemporary media work, and at how journalism and politics overlap and influence each other. It twists, as befits good satire, without going completely off the rails à la Don’t Look Up (2021). The characters are all well written and realistic. Although they are each terrible in their own way, you also empathize with them. In terms of style and angle, the film is occasionally reminiscent of the Dutch De Veroordeling (2021), which also heavily criticizes the game between media and politics.
Subtle but sharp
Dumont did not base his film on a true story, but it is very close to reality. You could describe France as a fictional essay about short-lived fame, about the hypocrisy of sensationalists, about truth-finding in the digital age and about how easily the people throw a celebrity in front of a bus as soon as a step is taken wrong. There is a lot in this film, but the symbolism is never exaggerated. France is such a work that you can revisit endlessly, and that you will come up with something new every time.
Image: Still ‘France’ via Filmdepot
