A Faithful Man | Louis Garrel | NYFF 2018
French actor and filmmaker Louis Garrel returns with the delightful new film A Faithful Man, which he co-wrote along with Jean-Claude Carrière.
Garrel also stars as Abel, a character who should be celebrating the news that his girlfriend, Marianne (Laetitia Casta), is pregnant. Thing is, it’s not his baby, but his former best friend, Paul. The story progresses a full decade later when the two former lovers reconnect at Paul’s funeral and start over their relationship again, even with Marianne and Paul’s son Joseph (Joseph Engel) in the picture.
Joseph is understandably going through a hard time which is why it’s even more puzzling when he suggests that his mom poisoned his dad and that Abel could be next. This puts Abel on edge and makes the timing of the sudden romantic interest in Paul’s younger sister, Ève (Lily-Rose Depp), who has been harboring a crush on him ever since they were young kids.
Abel has some mighty good fortune of being blessed by Marianne with the chance to sleep with Ève, as she is willing to let him test these waters, confident enough that he’ll eventually come back to her.
There’s an absurd nature to the film that Garrel strikes an odd tone, one that is straddled with some absurd humor that he and Carrière tie together in a rather amusing fashion thanks to a witty and delightful script carried well by the cast of Garrel, Casta, Depp, and Engel.
While it does feel a bit shy of really digging deep and providing some revelatory or insightful new answers about love and romance, there’s enough there to make this a delightful little romp that plays extremely well after a festival full of much more serious and tougher subject matter. Sometimes you just need a fun little romantic fantasy ride to help make the rest of the world that much more digestible.
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