Jolly Old France

SOMETHING IN THE AIR (A-minus) - Ah, to be in Paris in the wake of May 1968, when revolution seemed possible and the women looked like Charlotte Gainsbourg. I was pleasantly surprised by Olivier Assayas' tender tribute to his youth at the height of the student protest movement.

Sharing an ethos with David Chase's "Not Fade Away," this French take is more meandering and less in your face. It follows scruffy high school student Gilles (a charismatic Clement Metayer) in 1971 as he struggles to reconcile his love of art, film, the pursuit of girls and the appropriate level of devotion to the struggle against the system. Assayas establishes a dreamlike quality, more like a Bob Dylan song than a political polemic. He wields a seamless soundtrack here, with songs by Soft Machine (below), Phil Ochs, Nick Drake, Captain Beefheart and the trippy hippies Amazing Blondel. (I was confused by the timeline here, expecting to be in 1968 (I missed the opening marker), but Assayas signals the later era early on when a character drops a needle on Syd Barrett's "Terrapin," which was released in 1970.) An eight-minute party scene at the start of the second half of the film, with a haunting fire theme, is epically rendered to Soft Machine's "Why Are We Sleeping?"




Gilles loses the enigmatic Laure (a free spirit who offers post-coital critiques of his paintings and schools him in the poetry of Gregory Corso) but soon takes up with the more down to earth Christine (the brooding Lola Creton, "Goodbye First Love"), a fellow agitator. After causing their share of trouble, leaving one victim in a coma, the gang heads to Italy to let things cool down. The movie takes on an international flavor at this point, including the addition of cinnamon-haired American Leslie (the engaging India Menuez), among others. We follow a group of guerrilla filmmakers who strive for pure authenticity in documenting the workers' struggle in the third world. ("We don't do fiction," they declare.) Maoists clash with anarchists and socialists, and eventually real life and practical concerns catch up with these emerging adults.

Assayas is in touch with that heady time, and he shows a sure hand. (The New York Times said his "camera moves among young bodies like an invisible friend.")  He has produced less an exercise in nostalgia than an honest re-examination and exploration of how we come of age within the particular age we live in. 

POPULAIRE (B) - This debut feature is a harmless bit of fluff that finds clever ways to be appealing. Newcomer Regis Roinsard uses a light touch with this corny period piece in which a rural gal in France's bobby-soxer era strikes out from her stifling small town to make it in the big city as a ... secretary.

Deborah Francois is delightfully bubbly as Rose Pamphyle who catches they eye of insurance agent Louis (a cleaned-up Romain Duris) during his secretary search. He hires her despite her hunt-and-peck method and decides, Hollywood style, to turn her into a typing champion.

Louis trains Rose like a racehorse and teaches her how to touch type like a pro. In an adorable sequence, he gives a different color to each set of keys assigned to each finger, and Rose shades her fingernails accordingly; the primary colors are dazzling.

It's at this point that you are either all in or are thinking of bailing out. But if you give in to the silliness, it's quite a trip. Soon, Rose scorches the field in regionals and works her way up to the French nationals, hoping to go to the world championships in New York. Were there ever such typing competitions? Who cares. This is giddy bubblegum pop. Play along.

BONUS TRACK

From "Something in the Air's" trippy final shots and the credits, "Decadence" from Kevin Ayers, who died one year ago: