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James Mottram

2/5 stars
Asghar Farhadi, the esteemed, prize-winning Iranian director behind A Separation and The Salesman, returns to France for his third foreign excursion.
His first, 2013’s The Past, was a lean work that claimed Bérénice Bejo the best actress prize when it played at the Cannes Film Festival. This latest Parisian-set tale of voyeurism, which also unspools in Cannes’ main competition, is a bloated misfire, despite boasting the crème de la crème of French cinema.
Parallel Tales is loosely inspired by the sixth episode of Krzysztof Kieslowski’s epic Dekalog, which was later expanded into the feature-length A Short Film About Love. Sadly, while the bones of the Kieslowski work remain, none of its tension does.


At the core here is Isabelle Huppert’s ageing novelist Sylvie, who has a telescope in her flat trained on the building opposite while she seeks inspiration for her new book. Across the way is a sound recording studio, where Nicolas (Vincent Cassel), his brother Theo (Pierre Niney) and Nita (Virginie Efira) work closely.
There is a frisson that sparks Sylvie’s work into life, but the story really takes off – or rather does not – when Adam (Adam Bessa), a drifter and former prisoner with literary ambitions of his own, enters her orbit. When he reads Sylvie’s work, he becomes obsessed with Nita – or ‘Anna’, as she is dubbed in Sylvie’s pages.
Characters end up spying on each other, but there is never the bristling tension or romantic intrigue of, say, Hitchcock’s Rear Window. Only an altercation among Cassel, Bessa and Efira on a Metro platform has any real dramatic flavour; for the most part, confrontations in cafes fizzle out into nothingness.
Likewise, the characters are poorly etched; the likes of Cassel and Niney are utterly wasted as one-dimensional ciphers.

Co-scripted by the director with his own brother Saeed Farhadi, the film also borrows composer Zbigniew Preisner’s score from the Kieslowski original, but otherwise the two pieces feel poles apart. Even a crazy-haired Huppert in manic top gear and a brief appearance by Catherine Deneuve cannot save this from tripping over itself.
Arguably the most interesting element comes with Nita and company working as foley artists, that unsung role in the film world where sound effects, like footsteps, are recreated in a studio.
At one point, Nita talks about the excitement she felt in this world and the joy of discovering how everyone’s steps are unique; it is a beautiful moment in a film largely lacking in them. An acute dissection of the human condition this is not.
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This tale of voyeurism in Paris, starring Vincent Cassel, Virginie Efira and Isabelle Huppert, lacks any tension or romantic intrigue


This tale of voyeurism in Paris, starring Vincent Cassel, Virginie Efira and Isabelle Huppert, lacks any tension or romantic intrigue.


European cinema

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An assessment or critique of a service, product or creative endeavour.  Film reviews, restaurant reviews, reviews of art exhibitions. (Eg. Crazy Rich Asians: an important film, yes, but a good one?)


Review

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}This tale of voyeurism in Paris, starring Vincent Cassel, Virginie Efira and Isabelle Huppert, lacks any tension or romantic intrigue

This tale of voyeurism in Paris, starring Vincent Cassel, Virginie Efira and Isabelle Huppert, lacks any tension or romantic intrigue