If anyone has checked out this blog recently, you’ll see I’ve been making a lot of comparisons between movies. This one is no exception. Olivier Assayas’s ‘Irma Vep’ feels like the french/arthouse version of robert altman’s ‘the player’, except on a smaller scale without the murder. Assayas (a director i included in my “top 10 active directors” list) tries to show that Hollywood isn’t the only movie scene where there’s utter chaos going on behind the camera. And Hollywood isn’t the only place where backstabbing and shadiness, take place. ‘Irma Vep’ (an anagram for “Vampire”) is a movie about trying to remake of the old french silent film; ‘Les Vampires’, and all the craziness that goes along with it. In addition to that, its also a jab at modern french cinema (just like what ‘The Player’ was to Hollywood at the time of its release). Maggie Cheung stars as herself, set to reprise the title role in the remake (yes, she plays herself, but she is acting. this isn’t a documentary). The somewhat unstable/washed up director, played by Jean-Pierre Léaud, hired Cheung to act in the remake after seeing her agility and gracefulness in an action movie she did years ago. He seems to have no idea that all those agile and graceful maneuvers he saw were actually done by a stunt person and not Maggie Cheung herself. After a chaotic shoot the cast and crew look at the dailies, and the director is so unpleased with the footage he storms off the set and eventually has a nervous breakdown, leaving the fate of the film in limbo now that it has no director.
My favorite aspect of ‘Irma Vep’ isn’t so much the main plot, but rather all the little things that are going on in the background and the references to other movies (another trademark of Robert Altman and what made ‘the player’ so good). Unfortunately, if you aren’t up on french cinema, you wont get some of the little inside jokes and references about modern french cinema that Assayas makes. To some viewers, watching ‘Irma Vep’ without having much reference to classic french cinema might feel like watching Todd Haynes’s ‘Im Not There’, but knowing very little about Bob Dylan (which is exactly what happened to me when i went to see ’I’m Not There’). For example; legendary french actress Bulle Ogier has a cameo in ‘Irma Vep’, and makes a reference to how much she “likes latex”. Unless you’ve seen her classic french film from the 70’s; ‘Maitresse’, where she played a dominatrix, you’ll have no idea what she’s talking about, or why that line is funny. Sometimes ‘Irma Vep’ falls victim to being too “cool” for its audience and assumes everyone that watches it will understand everything.
Speaking of latex, the costume used in the irma vep remake is not only an obvious nod at the michelle pfeiffer catwoman outfit (in fact there’s a scene in ‘Irma Vep’ at the beginning of the movie, where the costume designer shows Maggie Cheung a picture of pfeiffer’s catwoman costume), but the latex costume also seemed to foreshadow Olivier Assayas growing fascination with leather, latex and S&M which he explored in his later films like; ‘Demonlover’ and ‘Boarding Gate’.
There are plenty of other clever scenes and funny references to not just french cinema, but the movie industry in general. Take the first few minutes of the film. At first it seems kinda chaotic with all the handheld cinematography, but after a minute you realize there’s a lot of structure. We see the same production assistant walk in and out of the scene holding a toy gun, trying to get approval from someone as to weather or not it looks real enough to use in a movie. The camera passes by a production manager arguing on the phone about budget, another production assistant wearing a ‘Terminator 2’ t-shirt quickly comes in to frame, etc. When Maggie Cheung arrives on set, fresh off of working on a kung-fu action movie, she’s surrounded by various crew members. Cheung’s character (which is, once again, herself), is more interesting than i think people realize. When she arrives on the set of the ‘Irma Vep’ remake (which is essentially an arthouse film), its almost like shes somewhat insecure that she just came from doing a big action movie, so she tries to play it off like; “oh whatever, it was just a stupid martial arts movie. i dont really care about it”. Any time in the film when Maggie Cheung is asked how she feels about french cinema or how she feels about acting in a remake of a classic french film, she gives these generic/vague answer like; “yeah, you know i like french movies a lot. i like the images” (which is such a vague & clueless thing to say). Later on in ‘Irma Vep’ there’s a scene where a somewhat prick-ish/pretentious film critic calls her out on her vague and generic attitude towards french cinema. Even the casting of Jean-Pierre Léaud as a director is obviously a reference to his role in ‘Last Tango In Paris’, where he also played a (pretentious) director.
Olivier Assayas has a unique perspective on french cinema in that not only is he a director, but he was a film critic for Cahier Du Cinema as well. Some people may see that as a conflict of interest. When you watch ‘Irma Vep’ you can see both sides of Olivier Assayas come out. You can tell that some parts of ‘Irma Vep’ were approached by Assayas’s film critic side, while other aspects of the movie where approached by his filmmaker side. If you like movies like; ‘24 Hour Party People’, ‘Ivans XTC’ or ‘The Player’, you’ll enjoy ‘Irma Vep’ (even more if you’re a fan of french cinema).