Diva (1981, Dir. Jean-Jacques Beineix)
Synopsis:
Opera-obsessed postman, Jules (Frédéric Andrei), makes a bootleg recording of young American soprano, Cynthia Hawkins (Wilhelmenia Wiggins Fernandez) — who is adamant that she never wants to make recordings — when she performs in Paris. He also steals the dress in which she performed. Later, Jules returns the dress and the two begin a tentative friendship, but Jules doesn’t tell her about the recording. Word about the recording begins to leak out however, which could damage Cynthia’s career and Jules tries to fix things. Little does he know, he’s also inadvertently become the recipient of another recording, made by an informant naming Chief of Police Saporta (Jacques Fabbri) as the head of a criminal network and Saporta’s two henchman are killing anyone who knows about this. Soon, Jules is being hunted by both the police and the criminals.
Here’s another example of a film that was underrated (on its initial release in France), became a cult classic (once it was shown in America) and was then re-evaluated; and yet, still (in my opinion) isn’t given the same standing as other films from around the same era, notably those of Beineix‘s contemporary Luc Besson, or even Beineix‘s later Betty Blue. Part of this is because it was the first film in what came to be called the cinéma du look, a tag that, much like that of the nouvelle vague from 20 years previously would come to be a handy journalistic „catch all“ for new, stylish-looking French films that were being released. However, unlike Besson’s early work which drew heavily on American film style, Diva also has its roots in French cinematic history, particularly the work of Jean-Pierre Melville (Le Samourai, Le Circe Rouge, Un Flic) — especially the opening scene with the police waiting to grab the informant and Saporta and Gorrodish’s meeting in the abandoned factory. For me, it’s the combination of Melville’s style of policier, with something new, that makes this film something truly original that stands apart from the other French films made at the time, in much the same way that À bout de souffle (Breathless) stands apart from the others in the nouvelle vague.
Diva looks amazing even now, over 40 years later. The camera angles, Phillipe Rouselot‘s beautiful lighting (which led to him becoming a heavily in demand cinematographer in both Europe and Hollywood afterwards) and the wonderful production design by Hilton McConnico and costumes by Claire Fraisse, that transform the characters and Paris into something close to magic realism. It’s also got a good score from Vladimir Cosma, even though one cue (you can hear in the trailer) sounds so close to Peter Gabriel’s Intruder, that I genuinely wonder whether the song had been used for the temp track.
However, this isn’t an example of style over substance. Adapted from the novel of the same name by Daniel Odier (under the pseudonym Delacorta), Diva has a strong plot, far more so than Besson‘s Subway (which shares its mix of crime thriller and music) or even Betty Blue, in my opinion. The motivations of certain characters (Richard Borringer’s Gorrodish, for example) remain slightly enigmatic to me, but that doesn’t detract from the film’s basic film noir-esque premise of corrupt cops trying to eliminate anyone who might expose them.
It’s also full of great performances from the entire cast, even those in supporting roles such as Thuy An Luu as the coquettish Alba and a young Dominique Pinion (later better known for his roles in films such as Delicatessen and Amelie) as one of the terrifying henchmen. However, the standout performances are definitely Frédéric Andrei, who manages to make Jules both sympathetic and charmingly odd at the same time. It takes skill to make such a contradictory character, who we first see illegally bootlegging a concert and stealing an opera singer’s dress into the character who becomes the hero that the audience is rooting for by the end of the film. In contrast, Richard Borringer’s performance as the reclusive Gorrodish, requires less — it’s a role designed to be cool and enigmatic — but Borringer’s triumph is to give him a heart, particularly when he comes to Jules’ aid after he’s chased and wounded by Sarporta’s thugs, which makes the character seem even cooler.
Sadly, aside from Betty Blue, which also became a massive cult hit, Beineix never really scaled the same heights, in his subsequent films, as he did here. Whilst Betty Blue is well regarded for its style, its plot, featuring depression and mental illness is as much of a slog as the very different (but also stunningly beautiful) Breaking The Waves for me, and his other feature films, Moon In The Gutter and Rosalind And The Lions, tip too far over into style over substance as far as I’m concerned. Here, he creates the perfect blend of crime thriller and stylized drama, that manages to walk the line between documentary realism and magic realism in a way that never makes you feel as if you’re lurching from one style to the other. Perhaps if he’d chosen to stay in a similar genre, as Besson did, then his work might have found greater success. As it was, he changed to making documentaries after 1989 and sadly he died from leukemia at the beginning of this year.
None of this changes how brilliant this film is though, which thoroughly deserves to be regarded as one of the best French films of the last 40 years and, indeed, of all time.
