Henri (2013)
Directed by Yolande Moreau

Film Review

Nine years after she made an impressive directorial debut with Quand la mer monte (2004), Yolande Moreau takes a break from her busy acting schedule to direct a second film, a similarly offbeat romantic drama involving another ill-matched pair of marginal characters.  With its honest portrayal of an intense love affair between a mentally handicapped young woman and a depressive older man Henri takes us into controversial territory, but Moreau seems oddly reluctant to get too close to her subject and consequently the film feels half-hearted and over-cautious.  Compared with Jaco Van Dormael's Le Huitième jour (1996), an earlier Franco-Belgian film which treads similar ground with far more daring and commitment, it is positively tame.

Henri's main asset is the memorable couple formed by its two lead actors, Candy Ming and Pippo Delbono, an inspired pairing if ever there was one.  Both actors are colourful individuals, artistic outsiders with a staggeringly wide range of talents.  The captivating Miss Ming has not allowed her autism to prevent her from becoming an accomplished poet, writer, actor and singer.  Gustave de Kervern and Benoît Delépine were the first film directors to exploit her formidable acting talents, in Louise-Michel (2008), Mammuth (2010) and Le Grand soir (2012).  Delbono's CV is no less impressive.  Having formed his own theatre company in Italy in the 1980s, he found success as a stage actor and director before he embarked on a promising career as an auteur filmmaker with Guerra in 2003.  In Henri, Ming and Delbono complement one another perfectly, the former's radiant humanity effectively contrasting the latter's introspective melancholia - like a ball of light illuminating a darkened room.  It is the authentic presence of these two remarkable people that makes Henri such an engaging and truthful film.

On the directing front, the film is generally far less impressive.  Moreau appears torn between bleak naturalism and oniric poetry and lacks the courage to commit to either.  With its subdued photography, glum dramatis personae and equally glum setting, Henri looks as if it may have been designed by Finnish director Aki Kaurismäki, but it lacks the essential underlying vitality of Kaurismäki's oeuvre.  Moreau brightens things up when she pops up in front of the camera (all too briefly) as a supporting character but Henri is otherwise a pretty dry and humourless affair.  There is a self-consciousness to Moreau's writing and mise-en-scène that prevents the film from entirely ringing true.  Its humanity comes more from the head than from the heart, its poetic interludes too coldly mechanical to touch and transport the spectator.  Worst of all, Moreau seems to be just too afraid to confront the central issue of her film, which is society's still deeply engrained prejudices towards the disabled.  Henri has much to commend it and it is certainly not without charm, but its mouse-like timidity prevents it from having anything like the impact it deserves.

Film Synopsis

Henri, a fifty-something of Italian origin, runs a small restaurant near to Charleroi with his wife Rita.  When Rita dies suddenly, Henri is devastated.  His daughter Laetitia comes to his rescue, suggesting that he seeks help from some mentally handicapped people at a nearby hostel.  Rosette is one such person, a young woman who is so cheerful and caring that you hardly notice her disability.  All that she wants is to live a normal life and be accepted as an ordinary person.  With Rosette's arrival, Henri enjoys a new lease of life...