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LIFE IN VENICE updated two times...it is that kind of film

Today's film was Andre Techine's

Impardonnables / Unforgivable (2011)

with André Dussollier, a fine actor, who we have seen before.

Here he is a writer. Two days in a row with writers. Both with blocks.

Here, we have life surrounding him. Many strands radiating from an original relationship between his girlfriend, then wife, and her lesbian lover and..........it all goes out from here.

There are plots and subplots and side trips. All worth taking. Not adding up to a lot, actually. But then this is a Techine film and very french.

He has a daughter who "disappears" while visiting him. Actually running away with a hot dope dealer who has a bit of aristocratic blood in his veins.

We see a lot of Venice. There are a few shocking scenes which I was not ready for. OK. It catches your attention and brings one back to the plot and the people. Life is dangerous.

And, to the title, there are many small and large unforgivable acts. Almost everyone in this has at least one. Some walk into the scenes and do an unpardonable thing to one of the principles.

Some acts represent ethical conundrums. We are shocked. Meant to be. But it turns out that perhaps the unpardonable thing did not deserve the payback given.

The viewer is a participant and a moral arbiter. We are forced to be.

I don't suspect this is Techine's greatest film. I enjoyed Wild Reeds and a few others. There is always a gay element in his stories but it is by the way, not a main theme. Not that it matters. In this one, the fags bash back.

I don't think that I have to love every film I see and while I did not love this one, it held me in and made me want to see what happened next. Always moving forward, always worthwhile. What else can we ask? Like life.

A 3 out of Netflix5.

Labels: films