The family dynamic has provided inspiration to countless film makers over the years, working in almost every genre, from horror to comedy. Now acclaimed director Michael Haneke has returned to the big screen after nearly five years, with his own view of a family in crisis. With this group, financial strife is not a source of conflict as they would definitely be considered as part of the “one percenters”, proving once again that money certainly never guarantees happiness. Toss in a few well deserved jabs at current use of tech and social media, and Haneke offers his take on a clan that may not achieve a HAPPY END.
Speaking of tech, the first scenes of this story unfold on a “top of the line” cell phone, as pre-teen Eve Laurent (Fantine Harduin) records the nightly rituals of her mother (brushes teeth, combs hair, etc.) will sending snarky comments in texts to a friend. When mom is hospitalized after a mistaken anti-depressive dosage, Eve is sent off to live with her father Thomas (Mathieu Kassovitz), a successful doctor, and his new, much younger wife Anais (Laura Verlinden). They all meet weekly for Dinner at the home of matriarch Georges Laurent (Jean-Louis Trintignant), a widowed octogenarian slowly slipping into dementia. Also attending is Thomas’s divorced driven older sister Anne (Isabelle Huppert) who runs the family oil empire. She’s grooming her twenty-something son, angry, hard-drinking Pierre (Franz Rogowski) to run the day-to-day operations of the company, when they finalize its sale to a banking conglomerate run by Brit Lawrence Bradshaw (Toby Jones), who is also engaged to Anne. Unfortunately an accident at a new oil tanker facility may jeopardize the sale (along with Pierre’s hot-tempered response). While exploring her new home, Eve hacks into her father’s laptop and discovers lots of passionate social network messages between him and another woman. All this happens as both siblings must deal with father Georges as he fumbles several attempts to end his own life. The many simmering conflicts come to a boil at the wedding of Anne and Lawrence.
Frequent Haneke collaborator Trintignant heads the fictional family and the cast, delivering a sensitive performance echoing themes of their last work, AMOUR. We feel Georges’s frustration as the march of time robs him of his mental and physical abilities. At he big dinner get-togethers, he’s a fuzzy, unfocused shadow, drifting in and out of conversations. This adds great power to his more lucid moments, as when he relates to his troubled granddaughter. Huppert’s Anne is full of stern determination as she readies herself to steer the family fortunes into the future. We see how the constant “juggling” of her private and business affairs takes a dizzying toll on her psyche. She’s now a parent to her own father, while trying to keep her own son on the right road to responsibility. Rogowski as Pierre is fighting her early every step of the way, bristling at her every objection and suggestion. His only joy seems to come from releasing his inhibitions at the local karaoke club, gyrating all over the stage and up the walls. As Annie’s brother Thomas, Karrovitz is a man who continues to get by on his charm, blinding everyone, including his new wife, with his dazzling smile. But beneath the mask, he can barely conceal his indiscretions and infidelity. But Harduin, as the wise beyond her years Eve, will not stand for his “act” as she chips away at his outer easy-going shell. She may be the most emotionally complex of the group, able to switch off her emotions in order to be a passive video witness to all the chaos around her. Harduin is a most compelling screen presence. As for the non-family roles, Jones is superb as the “outsider” who doesn’t quite grasp the fractured family dynamics (the language barrier just helps keep him in the dark).
Haneke, filming his own screenplay, shines a bright, unblinking light on the cracks in this dynasty’s public persona, while also delivering a blistering commentary on tech obsession. Eve, in particular, is more interested in recording and observing life than participating, her handheld device becomes both window and shield from reality. The switching from screens to regular narrative lets Haneke draw us in, while keeping us a tad “off-kilter”, wondering what’s going on at the keyboard or behind the cell phone. And for a few scenes, we’re looking at the action from a distance, without sound, as we try to interpret an incident through facial expressions and gestures , when Georges accosts several young men on a busy street. This all works to draw us further into the world of the Laurents, heightening the sense of isolation and alienation. Despite the promise of its title, HAPPY END is a tough, unsentimental look at a familial structure that may not survive the shifts of modern society.
3.5 Out of 5
HAPPY END opens everywhere and screens exclusively in the St. Louis area at Landmark’s Tivoli Theatre
