A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT. A Very Jeunetian Wartime Love Story

This is not a bland melodrama. It is not a typical war film either. Nor is it yet another smiling, sweet to the point of boredom role of Audrey Tautou. There is no pathos here, nor any blatant attempts to make the audience cry. However, there is a lot of blood, the direct cruelty of war is shown (there are plenty of soldiers torn apart by bombs), a poignant story, both a love story (touching, numerous flashbacks) and almost criminal, as Matylda (Tautou) tries to find the answer to the question of whether her beloved, sentenced to death for self-mutilation, died somewhere between the trenches of the French and German forces on so-called no man’s land, or whether he miraculously survived. A Very Long Engagement, standing in opposition to its romantically sounding title, offers spectacular, visually stunning cinema, gripping both by the throat and the heart – but in no way is it a sentimental romance, as the posters might mistakenly suggest!

Jean-Pierre Jeunet, the creator of the brilliantly crafted Delicatessen, The City of Lost Children, Amélie, and Alien: Resurrection, this time takes the audience to the times of World War I. However, Jeunet’s war, as you might easily guess, is not typical; grotesque elements mix with seriousness, and the specific humor contrasts with the shockingly realistic scenes of the battlefield. Jeunet’s characteristic close-ups of faces are supplemented by moments of dynamic editing and incredible shots in battle sequences. Very Long Engagement is an extremely elegant film in form, and thoroughly developed in terms of its story.

The structure of the screenplay, as the events unfold, increasingly resembles Akira Kurosawa’s classic Rashomon, causing certain facts to change (depending on whose perspective the events are presented from), never allowing the viewer to experience even a moment of boredom, which in a film lasting nearly 140 minutes is no small feat. With Jeunet, rather than the sparse, almost ascetic form known from Kurosawa’s film, we have an unparalleled grandeur, sound effects that knock you into your seat, and extraordinary special effects that, combined with the director’s amazing imagination, bring about scenes as incredible as throwing a grenade at the “Albatros” plane or the explosion of a dirigible hanging under the hospital roof, not to mention the beautiful shots in the lighthouse scenes; by the way, the camerawork done by Bruno Delbonnel – who also worked with Jeunet on the beautifully shot Amélie – deserves immense recognition!

However, the part of the film that most closely connects to the director’s style is the entire plotline involving a certain murderess of “high-ranking officers” – here Jeunet lets his twisted imagination run wild. We also find in A Very Long Engagement a few shots borrowed directly from David Fincher’s cinema: for example, a camera that enters a bomb and shows the moment of ignition (!). What is rare in today’s cinema, the director did not get carried away with the technical possibilities available to him, and in a perfect way, he combined form with content. For in the midst of war, Jeunet never forgets about the people, about his heroes, with whom the viewer becomes more and more attached with every passing minute, all accompanied by the moving, uplifting, and beautiful music by David Lynch’s court composer, the famous Angelo Badalamenti.

Jeunet’s heroes are, as always, individuals, sometimes quirky originals; Audrey Tautou and her character Matylda remain a dreamer and a fragile creature known from Amélie, radiating optimism and positive thinking, but in this new film by Jeunet, she plays with a more serious tone, avoiding any sugary sweetness, which in turn breaks away from her well-known screen image. In the background, we find several faces familiar from the director’s previous films; Dominique Pinon, who played the lead role in the cult Delicatessen, as well as smaller roles in Alien: Resurrection, Amélie, and The City of Lost Children; in A Very Long Engagement, he plays Matylda’s father, and as usual, his character remains memorable in a simple way.

There’s also Jean-Claude Dreyfus, the memorable butcher from Delicatessen, and among the supporting roles, we can spot Tchéky Karyo (from Dobermann, Nikita, Patriot), who also appeared in Amélie, albeit in a minor role as a man in a photo in Nino’s album. Since A Very Long Engagement is a French-American co-production, the film also features one of Hollywood’s biggest actresses. It’s only a cameo role, but it cannot go unnoticed, as it plays quite a significant part in the plot. It was a pleasant surprise to spot this American, very well-known actress in a film with a strictly French cast! The casting was spot on, and the combination of Jeunet’s unique humor with a well-crafted visual and sound aspect (some of the battle scenes surpass the spectacle of Saving Private Ryan) resulted in the creation of an extraordinary war film with a non-cliché love story in the background, or – as can be safely stated – an original love story amidst the turmoil of war.

There is something about this French director that makes his films always stand out, possessing a specific style, an unmistakable composition, and humor that is impossible to confuse with any other. In A Very Long Engagement, all these features, combined into a cohesive whole, provide emotional and touching moments in a very specific, Jeunet-like manner, and the only thing lacking in this film is the character played by Audrey Tautou… literally.