I’ve said it before, and now I’m going to say it again. Predictability, as a negative trait in a movie, is a trickier creature than most think, and it can be taken too far.

When I reviewed Family Man I mentioned this, because I had heard so many negative reviews of the film that mentioned predictability as though it were a serious flaw in the film. Then I saw it. It was not, in my opinion, suffering from any flaws by way of predictability. Was it predictable because Nicholas Cage’s character chooses the love of his life over being rich and alone? Well... duh. The name of the movie is ‘Family Man’, not ‘Rich Bastard’.

If this is the criteria, then we are left with somewhere around twenty total movies that aren’t predictable. Let’s face it, virtually all movies are predictable if all you mean is that you know how it’s going to end.

I found myself in the same boat with Chocolat. I had heard, from a staggering number of sources, that it was ridiculously predictable. It was anything but, in my opinion. I suppose it was predictable because we all knew that the good guys were going to win out in the end. To say that the movie is predictable in this semi-trivial way is really only useful if the movie is a murder mystery and it was painfully obvious who the killer was throughout the film.

The really curious thing about the idea is that this movie is almost in the category of fairy tales, and if you are going to fault them for having things turn out in the end, well, then you might as well start reviewing children’s books and including as a fault that you could see the ending coming a mile away.


On another note, Miramax studios is starting to convince me that they know one or two things. Apart from a couple that really make me roll my eyes (Bounce, for one), Miramax has turned out some pretty nice stuff.


The story works like this. Vianne (Juliette Binoche) and her daughter Anouk wander their way into a sleepy, little French town somewhere around the fifties. This certain town, as we are given to understand through fairy tale style narration, is extremely conservative and religious in its thinking. The town is run by Reynaud (Alfred Molina), the Mayor, who is in control of every bit of everyone’s life. He writes the priest’s sermons for him. He checks in at the hairdresser to start the gossip going. Everything in the town is run by Reynaud, and is controlled by his own, quite bizarre, ideas of religion and morality. The general theme being that fun, happiness, and facial expressions are the work of the devil.

To sum up the misery that is this little town, there is a certain woman who has been in mourning for her husband since he was killed in WWI. Did I mention it was the fifties in the movie?



Enter Vianne and her daughter Anouk. A strange, gypsy mother and daughter with a Central/Southern American background who travel from town to town spreading their chocolate good cheer. In a town like this, and at the beginning of lent no less, opening a chocolate shop is quite the wrong idea.

As Vianne prepares to open her shop, Reynauld comes to introduce himself and learns that Vianne is saving what sort of shop she is opening for a surprise (Reynauld is naturally turned off immediately... surprises do not fit in his little world), and that Anouk does not have a father.

Reynauld (I suppose you might say predictably) is immediately unhappy with his town’s new residents.

Before long, Vianne is treating her timid customers to all sorts of chocolate novelties, and wreaking havoc throughout the town by introducing common sense and smiles to the townspeople. She helps a grandmother who hasn’t been allowed to see her grandson, a battered wife, and several others who, eventually, join ranks with her in the fight against the oppressive nature of the town.

Just when things could not be going worse for Reynauld, a group of ‘river rats’, led by Roux (Johnny Depp), set up camp on the outskirts of town. Reynauld fancies that he can use this to his advantage by attacking the moral character of Roux and company (something the townspeople aren’t very opposed to), and turn everyone against Vianne into the bargain. Roux and Vianne, as partners in misfithood, are drawn to each other.


And there we leave the plot.


In almost every regard, the work that is this film is masterful. In some ways, the story moves along at somewhat plodding, controlled way, but this is hard to escape in a fairy tale, and doesn’t detract from the film. At times, we get a little too much ‘hand holding’, but again, there are some things you have to allow for based on what it is you are watching. There are lots of criticisms one might make of... say Caddyshack (although I don’t know what they are), but being about golf is hardly one of the more legitimate ones.

From the point of view of storytelling, everything is wonderful. Scenes, camera angles, color, lighting, and sound are all actually used. They aren’t just things that happen to be there. Early in the movie there is virtually no color to the town. Everything is darkly dreary, and the townsfolk wear nothing but blacks and dark browns. We see the sharp contrast as Vianne and Anouk arrive in their bright red stormcloaks. As Vianne and Anouk slowly infect the town, we see colors sparingly (and meaningfully) added to the scenes, until at the end we are given a rich pageant full of boisterous colorscapes. (Think Pleasantville with a purpose, and without having the color pointed right at you)

The acting is near perfect by everyone. Binoche is marvelously warm and engaging. Even Johnny Depp, who comes and goes careerwise, put on a decent performance, although his ‘now I’m Irish, now I’m not’ accent was distracting. Even the child actors were well above par, displaying a sense of true emotion and clearly showing that they knew what they (and the movie) were about.

In a movie like this, you’ve got to ask yourself, ‘Do I care?’ and ‘Do I feel?’ What we have here is something that forces us to answer these questions in wonderfully positive, and unique ways. We are even led to the refreshing conclusion that we care about Reynauld. He is not a wooden, fresh from the same old mold, despicable antagonist. He is a very real and accurately portrayed ‘person gone wrong’, and you find you care about him. You want things resolved, but you don’t simply want him to die or vanish, or even be completely vanquished. You find yourself hoping that he will still have his own place in the end.

The soundtrack is also excellent in its subtlety. Soundtracks, especially in such movies as this, are notorious for becoming mere flashing applause signs. Instead of working with a scene, they often simply tell us the scene. Turn the movie off and listen to the music and you are still told just as loudly what emotion you are supposed to be having.

In this one we find hints, and light tugs at the sleeve, instead of burly orders.


All in all, this one starts out with a good story (though a naturally somewhat simplistic one, that being the nature of the beast), works in a cast that performs well, and turns on moviemaking to a degree we, shamefully, run into sparingly. The result is everything this movie could have been, and I mean that in the best possible way.




Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: VHS
Video Occasion: Good Date Movie