"Fire" -- Movie Review

 

This week was the beginning of Lincoln Center’s French Film Festival; on opening night, I attended a screening of the new romantic drama “Fire”, co-written and directed by Claire Denis and starring Juliette Binoche. 

Synopsis

When a woman’s ex-lover re-emerges in her life, does she remain loyal to her husband or leave him to capture a past romance?

Story

It’s clear from the very beginning that Sara (Binoche) and Jean (Vincent Lindon) are madly in love with each other.  In fact, if you didn’t know better, you might think that they had been together for decades.  Actually, it’s only been a few years.  After Jean got out of prison, they wound up marrying, although they had been introduced to each other by Sara’s then-lover François (Grégoire Colin).  Jean and François were acquaintances at the time, while Jean was still with the mother of his teenage son, Marcus (Issa Perica).  Once Sara and François were no longer a couple, she took up with Jean. 

Jean and Sara have their love compromised when François enters their life once again.  With Jean trying to get back on his feet professionally, he decides to go into business with François when his friend starts a sports-related agency to recruit young new soccer players and develop them to reach a professional level.  Since Jean himself is a former athlete whose career was cut short due to an injury, it would only make sense that he could help make François’s venture a success.  But will this complicate matters with Sara, who still harbors feelings for François?  Neither François nor Sara are completely able of shaking each other. 

Meanwhile, Jean is trying to restore his relationship with Marcus, from whom he has been estranged for years; with his mother living abroad and his father imprisoned while he was a child, Marcus has mostly been raised by his paternal grandmother and has virtually no connection with his biological parents.  Regardless, Jean is aware of the fact that Sara and François remain drawn to each other once it becomes apparent that they have reconnected once he and Jean have become business partners.  But will this romantic triangle interfere with either the burgeoning agency or with the long-standing marriage?    

Review

When watching “Fire”, you can’t help but being reminded of the fact that the great Juliette Binoche is such an incredibly powerful actress – powerful not just because of her emotional expressiveness in her role, but also powerful in terms of how beautiful and sexy she is.  If you are not transfixed by her feminine beauty, then now might be a good time to check your pulse.  Simply put, this is quite an impressive woman.  Having said all of that, this movie is elevated by its cast – her chemistry with Vincent Lindon is extraordinary; in order to buy into this film, you must believe that they are a couple deeply passionate about each other.  That certainly comes through.

Despite this, it remains extremely disappointing that “Fire” is something of a letdown.  In some ways, it’s a little hard to believe that this is the same team that worked on Claire Denis’ “Let the Sunshine In” from just a few years ago, yet it feels like a much darker version of the film.  Denis does not allow Binoche’s character off the hook – she is in fact just as much at fault here as any other, if not more so.  Also, the way the story is told is somewhat scattered, almost as if it is trying to emulate the internal nature of Sara, who can’t quite seem to be able to know exactly what it is she wants in life.

One does not always quite understand whose story this is:  Is Sara supposed to be the protagonist here or should it be Jean?  As an audience, for whom should we be rooting?  Ultimately, we invest our emotions in neither character and perhaps that is the fatal flaw of this movie.  We desperately want to love both of these characters, but neither one totally seems worthy of our time and/or attention.  Even a woman as utterly delicious as Binoche or a storyteller as expert as Denis is quite capable of saving this one.  This is curious as such a story seems rather clearly in their wheelhouse.  If you are curious about this film, “Fire” is also known under the French title of “Avec amour et acharnement” (AKA, “  Both Sides Of The Blade”).