Get Out Your Handkerchiefs (1978)

After stumbling on Beau Pere (1981) earlier this year, basically by accident, I enjoyed it so much I wanted to see more by this French director, Bertrand Blier. Get Out Your Handkerchiefs (1978) was said to have similar themes, and I had actually heard of it before- as an Oscar winner for Best Foreign Film. But the title suggesting a sappy romance had put me off on seeing it before I saw Beau Pere.Sappy romance? Well, it's nothing off the sort. The film revolves around Solange, played by French Canadian Carole Laure, who's suffering an inexplicable deep depression with a range of negative symptoms. Her husband, Raoul, thinks an open marriage might cheer her up and enlists a stranger named Stéphane (Patrick Dewaere from Beau Pere) to be her lover.Now, unlike some, the concept of open marriage doesn't quite shock me. What's really humorously puzzling is that when Solange seems uninterested in an affair, Raoul insists on it. Even when Stéphane doesn't think it's very wise, either. Both men, as well as a neighbour grocer, become a team working on Solange, trying to cure her of her depression, puzzling about women. Earlier in the film, Raoul pulls a woman off the street to ask her about the situation; she later drops out of the movie, but it might have been funny to see her stick with the group, making the team puzzling over Solange even bigger.Half-way through the movie, Raoul, Stéphane and Solange work in a boys' summer camp, where they meet a 13-year-old prodigy, Christian. From here, the movie is mainly about Christian and Solange, with Raoul and Stéphane dropping to supporting roles- a little jarring at first, maybe. It's here where the movie shares a theme with Beau Pere, but with gender roles reversed- Christian and Solange become taboo lovers, and later, Solange and her team kidnap him, with Christian going willingly.Now, of course hebephilia and statutory rape are sensitive topics these days, but as with Beau Pere, I don't think Blier's movie is defending it all that much. It's obvious Solange isn't in the best state of mental health, and when Raoul and Stéphane bitterly walk away after serving 6 months in jail, they realize the whole thing wasn't worth it. Get Out Your Handkerchiefs is altogether a quirky, unique, and often funny movie. What I'm really left wondering about is the character of Solange- who is she, and how did she get the way she is? None of the characters can say for sure, they're not even sure if she's smart or "just plain dumb." It's said many times her depression is a result of having no kid, but why did she have a mental block against being pregnant? Ultimately, the audience is left to wonder along with Raoul and Stéphane while listening to Mozart and maybe sipping on a drink. Merci, Mozart.

This film is wonderful. Blier brings classic elements of French farce films into cuttings that remind me of Melville. He does a wonderful job of developing Solange, Raoul, and Stephane as caricatures...giving the viewer great understanding of how these characters will react in future situation. The eratic behaviors are completely acceptable on the same terms that the wild cuts...from dinner table to summer camp, and opening in a restaurant with no frame of reference...forces one to become involved in the story. So many Hollywood films 'do the work for you' so to speak. This leaves the movie experience stale. I'm not going to get involved in a film unless the director invites me to do so. Blier certainly does that. And the Mozart concerto helps. Gervase de Brumer.

If your ideas about sexual relations are fixed, don't see this film. Bertrand Blier turns everything upside down. No clichés here. This is relational anarchy at its most challenging. It's moving, it's stimulating and it is very well acted. Les valseuses was equally anarchic, but its tendency was rather unsympathetic. In Les valseuses, Depardieu and Dewaere were highly unlikeable. Here they are very likeable, and Carol Laure is beautiful in all her passivity.

Describing the plot of this film is rather pointless, since it reads in black and white rather absurdly, even for a comedy. But it works! The acting is great, (including a handsome and youthful Depardieu before he turned into a sloppy behemoth), the jokes are funny and the direction and camerawork make you feel like you've been dropped into a Van Gogh. What I like about French movies or at least what i used to like, was their ability to transport you into their wonderful culture for the duration of the film. Over the past 20 years however, French cinema for many dynamic cultural and economic reasons, has slowly allowed its identity to slip away. If you've never been to France or are just yearning to take a return trip for 90 minutes or so, this film will give you as good a taste of the French way and outlook on life, as a 2 week Frommers trip.