In Paris, in 1935, Madeleine Verdier, an actress who runs the cachet, is accused of the murder of a rich producer. Innocent, she nevertheless decides to confess in order to increase her notoriety. Pleading self-defense, the libidinous deceased having indeed tried to rape her, Madeleine is represented by her best friend, Pauline Moléon, an equally penniless lawyer. Before an exclusively male jury, at the time, the young defendant became the symbol of the oppression of women by men. His acquittal announces many twists and turns in the film my crimea detective comedy with satirical overtones that brings François Ozon back to the kitsch, and above all feminist, lands of Vase and of eight women.
Moreover, one of the stars of this jewel of 2002, Isabelle Huppert, embodies in my crime Huguette Chomette, a fallen silent film star who claims to be the real murderer.
The film, like Vase and of eight women again, is loosely inspired by a boulevard type play. Despite the prevailing humor, however, my crime turns out to be very serious on the subtext side. There is the subject, but also the time.
The historical context of the 1930s is fascinating, because there were so many crimes committed by women. However, if we revisit them now, with a modern sensibility, we will perceive many of these crimes in a completely different way.
“The historical context of the 1930s is fascinating, because there were a lot of crimes committed by women, explains the director of under the sandofSummer 85 and of Thanks to God, met in Paris last January. However, if we revisit them now, with a modern sensibility, we will perceive many of these crimes in a completely different way. »
The filmmaker cites two famous miscellaneous facts, namely the Violette Nozière affair, and that of the Papin sisters, which inspired Jean Genet to play The good ones.
“In the first case, it is a girl who kills her father because he rapes her; it’s an incest, but we didn’t talk about it then. Isabella [Huppert] told me precisely that on the set of the film Violette Noziere, Claude Chabrol and her hardly ever discussed this aspect. As for the Papin sisters, it’s a class crime: they are two servants who kill their boss. It’s fascinating, because these crimes wouldn’t be told in the same way today. In short, I wanted to keep this context of the 1930s, where women did not have the right to vote, did not have a checkbook, and where patriarchy was really uninhibited, to better make it resonate today. »
In fact, Madeleine (Nadia Tereszkiewicz) and Pauline (Rebecca Marder) face, throughout, various boys’ clubswhether it is the film industry, the judicial system (“We who are considered minors for our rights, but major for our faults”, pleads Pauline), or even the institution of marriage.
“What interested me, basically, opines the filmmaker, was to show how these two young women get out of it by using various stratagems. At first, their motivation is survival, but gradually they have a political awakening. »
A true lie
The concept of the “false culprit” at the heart of the play also immediately interested François Ozon, according to whom one can “lie to better tell the truth”: a formula that brings the filmmaker back to fetish themes such as dissimulation and mystification.
“The world is a theater stage, and we all play a part in it. What is interesting in cinema is that you can deconstruct that. Sometimes, when you play a character, you are even more yourself. I’m thinking of Madeleine’s plea, which led to her acquittal: at that time, she was in representation since she was interpreting the text that Pauline wrote to her. Except that it is there, at this precise moment, that she becomes a great actress, because she has never been so “true”. Madeleine touches the jury and the public, because she may not have written these words, she feels them deep within herself as an actress. »
The recurring motif of deceptive appearances also returns in the film through reconstructions of the crime, which reconstructions happily diverge.
“I was inspired by silent films — I shot silent films myself as a child with my little camera. What I liked was adapting, during these passages, to the point of view of the person telling the story, knowing that these points of view are divergent. »
Think of a parody of Rashomon.
“When Madeleine recounts her version of the facts, she portrays herself as an absolute victim, while when Judge Rabusset [Fabrice Luchini] There goes his hypothesis, we see her as a murderous upstart, because that’s how he sees her. And when it’s Huguette Chomette’s turn [Isabelle Huppert] to tell is something else again. »
Triumph together
However, you should know that none of this was in the original play by Georges Berr and Louis Verneuil. Nevertheless, by putting it in his hand, François Ozon knew that this dramatic material, in its outline and its structure, could become conducive to a fierce satire of the film industry.
“In the play, the protagonist is not an actress, and the murdered man is not a film producer. It must be said that the play was not really feminist. For example, the character equivalent to Huguette Chomette was a man. »
Huguette Chomette, who is openly bisexual, facing an unacknowledged and blushing lesbian Pauline Moléon, for a queer tangent as tasty as it is unprecedented…
“The play was set in the business world and focused more on the relationship between the press and justice; it was about scandals of the time completely forgotten since. Me, I wanted to transform all of this in such a way as to talk about things that concern today’s public: the relationships of influence that men can impose on women, the world of cinema, which I know well…”
In this chapter, we will gladly project the image of Harvey Weinstein on the abusive and rapist producer. But there is more. Indeed, with the characters of Madeleine Verdier and Huguette Chomette, we rub shoulders with the two extremes of the profession of actress: one aspires to the profession and must deal with many predators ready to take advantage of her hopes and her vulnerability, while the other was removed from the middle because now considered too old. Between 1935 and 2023, there are observations which, despite progress, remain: within a patriarchy that is certainly less uninhibited but which persists, it is often as difficult for a young woman to find her place as it is difficult for an older woman to keep hers.
To conclude François Ozon, cantor of mature actresses if there is one: “What is beautiful in the film, even if there was a rivalry between Huguette and Madeleine for a time, it is a feeling of sisterhood that prevails. . They triumph together. They win together. »
The film “My crime” hits theaters April 7. François Lévesque was in Paris at the invitation of the Rendez-vous Unifrance.