Non-Fiction
Directed by: Olivier Assayas
Written by: Olivier Assayas
Starring: Juliette Binoche, Guillaume Canet, Vincent Macaigne, Christa Théret, Nora Hamzawi, Pascal Greggory
Comedy/Drama/Romance - 108 min Reviewed by Charlie Juhl on 22 May 2019
Written by: Olivier Assayas
Starring: Juliette Binoche, Guillaume Canet, Vincent Macaigne, Christa Théret, Nora Hamzawi, Pascal Greggory
Comedy/Drama/Romance - 108 min Reviewed by Charlie Juhl on 22 May 2019
Olivier Assayas stands by his decision not go to film school, claiming whatever one needs to know about filmmaking, one can learn in three weeks. “What’s more essential is to have stuff to put into the films.” Clouds of Sils Maria and Personal Shopper, two recent film festival and independent film successes bear witness; Assayas may be onto something here. Yet, even the greatest of directors, including ones adept enough to skip film school, lose their idea’s thread and start to ramble. To sound like much of Assayas’s dialogue, “It is debatable,” and “one could argue that.” Non-Fiction is less a fully developed film and a “somewhat comedy” and more a series of situations designed to showcase rapid-fire dialogue as a slice of the Parisian elite hold court. A theme far more familiar to the audience than the characters on screen, technology changes things - out with the old, in with the new - threatens to upend known comforts, but apparently the Parisian discussion circle is here to stay.
Leónard Spiegel (Vincent Macaigne) absorbs the brunt of the film’s limited comedy at his own expense. His publisher, girlfriend, and interviewers tend to emphasize his limited sales and name recognition, but lean forward with a wink in their eyes when Twitter controversies arise about Leónard’s habitual assertion that he is not a novelist, he pens auto-fiction. All writers use material from the own lives in their work and much of fiction employs traits from real people. Leónard’s ex-wife takes to the Internet saying she feels “raped” by a character which is obviously her and shares the same life experiences. “But this is how I write,” Leónard complains; it can be no other way. Assayas is a fan of lobbing questions into the middle of an arranged salon session and watch it pinball around the room. Most of the time, the tone between the debaters concludes, “With all due respect, how dare you sir!”
Leónard Spiegel (Vincent Macaigne) absorbs the brunt of the film’s limited comedy at his own expense. His publisher, girlfriend, and interviewers tend to emphasize his limited sales and name recognition, but lean forward with a wink in their eyes when Twitter controversies arise about Leónard’s habitual assertion that he is not a novelist, he pens auto-fiction. All writers use material from the own lives in their work and much of fiction employs traits from real people. Leónard’s ex-wife takes to the Internet saying she feels “raped” by a character which is obviously her and shares the same life experiences. “But this is how I write,” Leónard complains; it can be no other way. Assayas is a fan of lobbing questions into the middle of an arranged salon session and watch it pinball around the room. Most of the time, the tone between the debaters concludes, “With all due respect, how dare you sir!”
The film’s most contentious topic is the nebulous idea of how the digital age will transform literature, its consumption and publication. E-books and accessing literature through other mediums than hardcover is nothing new, but Alain Danielson (Guillaume Canet), Leónard’s publisher and the film’s elbow into the business of books, attends conferences about the future of publishing, he hires a woman to lead his company’s move into digital transition, and after this woman (Christa Théret) also becomes married Alain’s lover, the adulterous couple spends their illicit, canoodling time arguing how algorithms will tell you want you want before you know you want it - typical pillow talk. Entering the salon setting again, a provocateur will lob a thought grenade like, “People are going to read book on iPhones,” and then subtly blend into the crowd as the heathen notion works its way through the desired uproar.
Someone mentions that, “Alain understands the zeitgeist,” that’s why he is so adept at publishing, he can see what’s next. Assayas, however, covers material, such as the writer’s responsibilities to real life people and the impact of the digital revolution, which feels like he missed these original conversations when they first happened. His script meanders while winding the audience through noisy rooms with a half-dozen people sharing ideas dressed up as well thought out manifestos even though the poseurs are spouting them off extemporaneously. An air of pretension permeates the atmosphere of red wine, finger foods, and subtle games of one-upmanship. Those who dream of Paris salons and being included in a gathering known as the intelligentsia will recognize the pomposity, but would still love to dip their toe into it.
Non-Fiction is a curious, watered down version of the original, French title, Doubles Vies, which means double lives. All the film’s main characters masquerade in double lives, Alain in his affair, Leónard in his, and Alain’s wife, Selena (Juliette Binoche, The 33), - she is sleeping with Leónard. Selena leads an overt double life as an actress on a gritty TV cop drama, but must remind inquisitors she is not a policewoman, but a crisis management expert, a little extra detail emphasizing the question asker must already not get it if they reduce her role to cop.
Since this is a French film, the adultery is beside the point. Non-Fiction is not about hurt feelings, accusations, and screaming matches. The idea of a paramour on the side is taken seriously, but nobody loses their mind over it, either when they’re caught or when they confess. Getting upset over who engages in sexual relations with whom would also point toward a plot line, a device the characters in the film mostly avoid. Rather than sequential scenes pointing toward a conflict to confront and challenge, Non-Fiction is a series of scenes which exist to celebrate dialogue and the aesthetic culture of wine, wariness, and whinging. New technologies are on the way, some will disrupt the status quo and some will seamlessly integrate into how we do things now, but Non-Fiction will fade away as a forgotten entry into Assayas’s strong filmography and end up as a challenge question in these salons - “Oh really, you’ve seen every Assayas film? What about Non-Fiction?”
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