"Vendredi Soir (Friday Night)"
It is a bitterly cold night and Paris is gripped in yet another transit strike. Laure (Valerie Lemercier) has just left her apartment for the last time and will move in with her boyfriend the next day. But, for now, she is warmly ensconced in her car stuck in traffic, listening to music on the radio. A handsome stranger stands in the cold by the side of the road in the glow of neon lights. Laure throws caution to the wind and offers the man, Jean (Vincent Lindon), a ride but the two will, instead, celebrate a special "Vendredi Soir."
Director Claire Denis and novelist Emmanuele Bernheim have adapted for the screen the latter's book Vendredi Soir and have come up with a quiet, elegant story of two ships passing in the night. The ships happen to be Laure and Jean and the night is a Friday where Paris is grid locked by the strike. The chance meeting starts off a bit rocky with Laure regretting her kindness to the man, unsure of just what she just got into. Jean is a man of few words as he sits quietly and smokes amid the stalled traffic. As the initial tension dissolves between them, a bond forms as they, first, go to dinner and, then, to a nearby hotel.
This is a Cinderella-type story that uses very few words and lots of facial and body language by Lemercier and Vinton to convey volumes of emotion. Laure is leaving one life, that of a single woman, and is about to embark on a more permanent relationship with her unseen, unnamed boyfriend. Her chance meeting with Jean begins, as a kindness but there is some untapped emotion deep inside her that the stranger brings out. Both know that this is an affair for one night and they approach it with a hunger that surprises Laure.
"Vendredi Soir" is a two-person passion play with the emphasis on "passion." Laure knows that she is committed to her boyfriend but the anonymity of her encounter with Jean, on the cusp of major change in her life, is enough for her to justify the experience. Jean remains an enigma throughout the story as he gives Laure what she needs without demand on his part. Does Jean have a hidden and sordid past? Did he kill a man? In the context of this brief encounter it doesn't really matter as the couple (and us, the voyeuristic viewers) abandon any personal restrictions and blithely tumble into bed. The parting is bittersweet as we wonder what would have happened if they remained together for a while longer. Valerie Lemercier and Vincent Lindon have a nice chemistry going and make you believe that these two people would have a short-lived, passionate, no strings relationship.
Helmer Denis, in her previous two films ("Beau Travail" and "Trouble Every Day") journeyed from the sublime to the ridiculous. Fortunately, the writer/director, with "Vendredi Soir," is back on track, once again teaming with her favorite cinematographer, Agnes Goddard, to create a tight, emotion-laden look into the lives of two people who, oh so briefly, come together. The film, with its striking views of Paris at night and the central couple, is beautiful to look at. Goddard has an exceptional eye (she even made "Trouble Every Day" look good) and she makes "Vendredi Soir," for all of it nighttime locations, crisp and clear.
Although "Vendredi Soir" is getting theatrical release now, I had seen it in September of 2002 at the Venice Film Festival. I give the film credit that, now, months later, the images and emotion remain strong within me - this is at a time when the typical Hollywood film is forgotten within days. This says something for this nice, offbeat little French film. I give it a B+.
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