France (Bruno Dumont, 2021) (Patreon)

A lot of major French directors, such as Olivier Assayas and Arnaud Desplechin, make a habit of hopping from genre to genre, bringing their particular sensibility along with them as they try their hand at this and that. So why should Bruno Dumont be any different? There seems to be a misconception about Dumont, that as an artist he is so endemically weird that he simply doesn't have the ability to play it straight. But look at the track record: Bressonian Surrealism (L'humanité, Flandres), an Antonioni-style trel through "America" (Twentynine Palms), a psychological study of fanaticism (Hadewijch), an austere star vehicle (Camille Claudel 1915), a bonkers deconstruction of Peak TV (the two Quinquin series), two Christian rock musicals (the Joan of Arc films), and the utterly unclassifiable Slack Bay. 

Say what you want, but Dumont is versatile. Perhaps that's because he learned his craft making anonymous industrial films. In any case, France is not only a showcase of Léa Seydoux, and not only a media satire. It seems to both mock and embody the idea of cinema as Grand Statement, the notion that cinema could ever truly capture the state of things. Recall that Gaspar Noé originally wanted to call I Stand Alone "France." Here, Dumont "casually" features the Eiffel Tower and the Arc de Triomph is shot after shot. He's not just poking fun at the idea of Parisian iconography. He's drawing attention to the concept of geographical specificity in a globalized world. (We could maybe call this tendency French Exceptionalism.)

Seydoux, of course, plays France de Meurs, a flashy, narcissistic TV journalist who never fails to make herself the story. Strategically placing herself in the dangerous international hotspots that Christiane Amanpour used to frequent, France is much more akin to the various interchangeable blonde women who anchor Fox News and CNN. In the first half of the film, we see France and her crew at work, and I honestly can't think of a more instructive, nuts-and-bolts depiction of how TV news is made, with the exception of Charlie Brooker's classic deconstruction of official network newspeak on Newswipe. As France, her camera operator, and her soundman struggle to keep up with armed Arab insurgents or nestle into a boatful of eerily telegenic refugees, they never fail to stage manage these real-life events, telling their subjects how to hold the gun, or asking all the questions twice to get cinematically proper reverse-shots.

It would have been very easy for Dumont to chug along in this vein, creating a savage, darkly comic 21st century riff on Network. But France keeps changing its trajectory. This will no doubt frustrate some viewers, since it's true that once you're really on Dumont's wavelength he chucks it all and starts over. But there's more than a method to the madness. There's a moral imperative. Once France begins focusing on the various crises in France's personal life, Dumont and Seydoux make obvious shifts in style, at times edging toward a parody of Douglas Sirk's utterly sincere parodies of the Hollywood melodrama. Seydoux "acts," frozen before the camera in emotional agony, crying on cue, while Dumont ostentatiously gives her (and France) her close-up.

The joke, of course, is that there is no difference between France on or off camera. She simply has to adjust to her different roles. If Dumont had made a more straightforward critique of the mass media, it might have been satisfying. There are moments in France that suggest that Dumont is a secret Almodóvar fan. But if he had followed that road, France would smugly suggest that it stands outside of the system it means to criticize. Instead, with its aggressive artificiality and a brilliant performance by Seydoux, as the Barbie Doll Who Cares, France is willing to indict itself, to underline its hopeless shout into the void.

It should be mentioned that France does have what appears to be an emotional break midway through the film. Seydoux plays this perfectly, because we can never be certain whether there is a psyche behind the facade, or if she is indeed a sociopath, able to wander through the wreckage of life -- her own and others -- without so much as a scratch. In a way, France is a lot like Lucrecia Martel's The Headless Woman. The protagonists of both films are privileged, high-functioning nonentities who, shall we say, hit a bump in the road. But where Martel indicates that Véro is totally isolated from the larger world, Dumont gives us an individual who "engages" by plunging headlong into the misery of others, secure that wealth and fame are the only flak-jacket required.

Near the end of France, de Meurs goes to the countryside to interview the wife of a child-killer. Her approach is no less fraudulent than before, but as she and her (new) crew stare at a makeshift memorial for the murdered little girl, she turns and gazes out over a muddy field. After a film that for most of its running time has been so immaculate, so severely coifed and lacquered, the field is a little bit odd. In fact, it looks a lot like Dumont's home town of Lille, as he depicted it in L'humanité and Outside Satan. France stares at the muck and remarks, much to her companions' surprise, "it's really beautiful here." 

The director, it seems, cannot help himself. Maybe he's not such a chameleon after all.