LITTLE WHITE LIES : archive from 19th June 2011.

Saw 'LITTLE WHITE LIES' last night expecting something hum drum from this French subtitled movie but was engaged throughout and pleasantly surprised. This film was Written and Directed by French Actor/Writer/Director Guillaume Canet, who is also the other half of acclaimed Actress Marion Cotillard, and on a budget of just over US$15M brought home US$87M from this comedy drama of friends, anxieties, tortured relationships, fractured lives and lost opportunities amidst the backdrop of a holiday in a comfortable but fairly modest beach house.

If you have been away for the weekend, or longer, with a bunch of mates then here is something for you. This is richly cast, with strong performances that deliver emotion, humour and multi-layered personalities that both attract and repel. This in turn makes for a relateable film on many levels with laugh out loud moments and a tear jerker at the end. The French title of the film (refer poster left) is 'Les Petits Mouchoirs' meaning 'the small handkerchiefs' - -as in to keep something hidden in your pocket from view by using a handkerchief to conceal it!

The film opens with Ludo (Jean Dujardin) hanging an all-nighter in some Paris nightspot with girls, booze and drugs only to jump on his scooter for the ride home just as day breaks to get blindsided by a truck and sent into a coma. His long term friends all visit him in hospital on the cusp of their annual beach break away together to kick-start the holiday season -  ritual they have upheld for years. Deciding that they should still proceed with their planned holiday - because it's what Ludo would have wanted - they set off for their destination in the sun and by the sea to Cap Ferrat.

The beach house in question is owned by successful Restauranteur Max (Francois Cluzet) who brings along the wife and kids and is we learn, controlling, obsessive, and short tempered. This manifests itself throughout the holiday period when he is driven to his wits end by the sound of termites gnawing away in the cavities of his beach house, and when emotions clash because his good friend and practising chiropractor Vincent (Benoit Magimel) announces that he is in love with him - even though he too is married with children, and doesn't consider himself gay!

Then there is Marie (Marion Cotillard) who is the former girlfriend of Ludo now languishing in a hospital bed in a near death state. She is an anthropologist who recently returned from a trek around the Amazon Rain Forest, but cannot commit to anyone, because she is unable to commit to herself - she doesn't know if she's Arthur or Martha (literally). Her close friend is Eric (Gilles Lellouche) who is a minor small screen Actor but constantly tries his hand with the ladies and is always hitting on Marie, although she will have none of it.

As your would expect though most of the dialogue, the action and the comedic drama rests with the men . . . or should I say boys . . . who strut their stuff, big themselves to their mates, brush of their emotions, and dispel their insecurities whilst the womenfolk look on with ever increasing disdain. all of this more and more pressure on their friendships as tensions mount, emotions ride high, and the stress and strain of each others company begins to show. 

Of all the colourful disjointed emotionally charged characters in this film there will almost certainly be one you can relate to the most. There are laugh our loud moments and those too you will cringe at as worlds collide and long hidden truths revel themselves. This is an engrossing film that at a 154 minute running time will flash by quickly, pull you in and capture your interest throughout. If you missed this first time around, do yourself a favour and grab it now on DVD or BluRay.

-Steve, at Odeon Online-