Ne touchez pas la hache (2007)

Note Générale:

6,8/10   

Réalisateur:

Jacques Rivette

Scénaristes:

Honoré de Balzac (novel) and
Pascal Bonitzer (writer)

Date de sortie:

28 mars 2007 (France)

Genre:

Drame | Musique | Romance

Intrigue:

In Majorca, in 1823, a French general, Armand de Montriveau, overhears a cloistered nun singing in a chapel; he insists on speaking to her...

Plot Keywords:

Nun | Letter | General | Kidnapping | Ball

Récompenses:

2 nominations

Avis des utilisateurs:

The story of Jeanne and Guillaume.

Ensemble

Jeanne Balibar	...	Antoinette de Langeais
Guillaume Depardieu	...	Armand de Montriveau
Bulle Ogier	...	Princesse de Blamont-Chauvry
Michel Piccoli	...	Vidame de Pamiers
Anne Cantineau	...	Clara de Sérizy
Marc Barbé	...	Marquis de Ronquerolles
Thomas Durand	...	De Marsay
Nicolas Bouchaud	...	De Trailles
Mathias Jung	...	Julien
Julie Judd	...	Lisette
Victoria Zinny	...	La mère supérieure
Remo Girone	...	Le confesseur au couvent
Beppe Chierici	...	L'alcade
Paul Chevillard	...	Duc de Navarreins
Barbet Schroeder	...	Duc de Grandlieu

Autre(s) titre(s):

The Duchess of Langeais (Canada: English title) (USA) (new title)
Don't Touch the Axe (International: English title)
La duchessa di Langeais (Italy)

Durée:

137 min

Pays:

France | Italy

Langue:

Français

Couleur:

Couleur

Rapport de forme:

1,85 : 1

Son:

Dolby SR

Classification:

Canada:14A | USA:Unrated | France:U | Argentina:13

Société:

Pierre Grise Productions

Anecdotes:

The film keeps the original title of Balzac's novel from March 1834.

Goofs:

Anachronismes: When Armand is reading the final letter of the Duchess, a wall socket is visible.

Connexions:

version de La duchesse de Langeais (1995) (TV)

The story of Jeanne and Guillaume.

Jacques Rivette, who's almost 80 years old, seems now to have definitively abandoned the lighten world he gaves glimpses of in the wonderful "Va Savoir" and in the musical "Haut Bas fragile" (which has more down than up), two movies full of youth and wit. He gets back with "Histoire de Marie et Julien" in 2003 in a darker and saddest universe (and also, let's be honest, a way more boring one). "Ne touchez pas la hache", with its depressive tone, its damaged story and its Balzac's "Histoire des 13" adaptation, definitely belongs to the second part of Rivette's movies (that is darker and boring...), but manage to be much more passioning than Rivette's last opus.

The movie is a cinematographic translation of Balzac's "La Duchesse de Langeais", where everything, from the structure in three parts with a flashback, to the dialogs, is respected. This serious exercise is a little bit academic, but the lack of imagination is tempered by the Romanesque density of the book, which keeps the spectator's interest awake during the all movie. This fidelity to the sad and unconsumed love story sometimes brings interesting and unpredictable changes. The turning point of the movie, which tells the seduction of an intrepid General by duchess full of frivolity, has for example a very different aspect in the book and in the movie, even if it's exactly the same thing. The scene deals with Montriveau kidnapping Antoinette, as a demonstration of his will, love and power, and she'll deadly falls in love with him, as a consequence of this act. In the realistic yet dramatic world of Balzac's "Histoire des 13", this act is absolutely credible and logic, but in the soft and slow universe of Rivette, the scene almost appears unreal, as if it's only one of the Duchesse's phantasm, and you have to wait until the end to get ride of this unreality's veil.

The movie is for that reason absolutely faithful to Balzac, but also absolutely personal and definitely belongs to Rivette's personal universe. And the interest of the movie would have stayed relative, if the actors didn't bring live and movement to this static motion picture. It's indeed Jeanne Balibar and Guillaume Depardieu (most impressive in a intense and tortured Montriveau-Balzac) that creates the tension and the emotions, which would certainly have lack to this movie without them.