Review of 5X2

Introduction

I had high expectations for this film. Young French Director Francois Ozon showed that good old fashioned attention to composition and the poetry of cinema were alive and well and residing in France with movies like `Swimming Pool`, `8 Women` and `Under the Sand`. With studied reserve, gentle pace and breath-taking attention to the aesthetics of every shot, Ozon was a man to watch.

And then came `5 x 2`, an ambitious movie based around a narrative in reverse, featuring the break-up of a marriage. It`s an inventive approach that, whilst not entirely a first (Harold Pinter can claim that accolade with `Betrayal`), it makes for an interesting film that aims to reveal that the seeds of discontent are frequently sewn long before they manifest in total breakdown. The screenplay was co-written by regular collaborator Emmanuelle Bernheim and is certainly cleverly penned.

The film opens with a couple sitting in a magistrate`s office whilst a clerk reads the various agreements of the divorce settlement in a dispassionate way whilst the couple stare sadly into the middle distance. Marion (Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi) and husband Gilles (Stephen Freiss) then make their way to a hotel bedroom where they plan to have a final sexual encounter.

In the melancholy half-light, Marion decides that she doesn`t want to go through with it - but husband Gilles forces himself upon her. This makes for some uneasy viewing as we don`t yet understand the nature of their relationship, and it`s difficult to know whether her protestations were real. But it highlights the incongruities from the outset. The scene in the hotel room ends with husband Gilles asking ` Do you want to try again?` Marion leaves without replying.

We then move back in time to a dinner party where Gilles gay brother and boyfriend engage in some frank conversation with the couple. The scene in their apartment actually opens with Gilles caring for their three year old son, having already prepared the dinner. When Marion returns from work we are already getting an idea about the balance of their relationship - which is accentuated later when Gilles advises her on how best to load the dishwasher.

During the dinner we learn of Gilles indiscretions at a party where he seems to have joined in at an orgy whilst Marion merely looked on. Again it`s not straightforward, though the atmosphere suggests that the marriage is already in the advanced stages of decay.

We then flashback to the birth of their son, which, for some undetermined psychological reason, Gilles cannot be a part of. It seems that he fears the commitment that the birth brings with it.

Their wedding night is also unusual with Gilles falling asleep as Marion `slips into something more comfortable`. Finding herself alone, she changes into jeans and a jumper and walks in the hotel grounds, meeting a stranger that ends in a sexual encounter. As she returns to the room and embraces Gilles, it`s clear that she has used this encounter to imagine a perfect union with him. All a little odd.

The final scenes (the first of the five key stages of a marriage) are those that show the couple meeting on a holiday as if they were pre-destined to get together. But don`t let me spoil the ending for you. Or do I mean the beginning?!

Video

This is a visually stunning movie with few cuts and carefully choreographed camera moves and wonderful composition. This transfer is really very good too so you may get some sense of the impressive cinematic scale even in the comfort of your own home.

Audio

Apart from the haunting refrain of the title score (repeated often) there is little further of note other than the usual heavy French dialogue in what is a very wordy movie.

Features

For a French title this comes replete with a decent set of extras. Whilst there is no Director`s commentary, there is a 15-minute `Making of…` featurette which uses a fly-on-the-wall camera to capture the Director at work through a days filming. This all works well - and unusually has no commentary and no sycophantic talking heads either. There are also a number of deleted scenes including one that is entitled `prologue` and features Marion and Gilles waking up in their new shared apartment. Whilst visually stunning, this is incredibly slow moving and it`s not difficult to see why it ended up on the cutting room floor. There`s also the obligatory photo gallery - this time soft-edged and set to some romantic piano music. (Still can`t figure out why these get included - they`re just stills from the movie. If you like them so much use the pause button on the remote …). The extras also include a theatrical trailer (that make the movie look a little saucier than it is) as well as some trailers for other releases including the superior English language movie `Swimming Pool`.

Conclusion

There is no doubt that `5 x 2` is far superior in many respects than many of its overblown Hollywood counterparts. It`s visually stunning and is based on a pleasing concept - a narrative played out in reverse across five distinct `episodes`. It`s the kind of self-challenge that Director`s love.

But in truth, though there are some poignant melancholic moments here, it`s not a movie that is easy to engage with. The characters are just too oblique to sympathise with - we never really get to know them properly, despite some entirely convincing performances. And as a typically gently paced French movie, the action is just a little too slight to raise the temperature. (This is certainly not as engaging as `Swimming Pool` for example). In short - despite the impressive sum of its many parts, it just doesn`t quite cut the mustard. Not Ozon`s finest film - but a perfectly acceptable one.