The Perfume of the Lady in Black

Along with the Larrieu Brothers, the Martineau-Ducastel couple, or even Danièle Dubroux, Bruno Podalydès is, without any doubt, one of those who bring something new to French comedy nowadays and make it a clever, refined and somewhat subversive entertainment.

Born in 1961, Bruno Podalydès studied cinema in Saint-Denis University, before directing a series of corporate films for Air France featuring his brother Denis Podalydès,“the Antoine Doinel of corporate film”, he said. Their respective careers are now inseparable, since Denis plays the main part in all Bruno’s films. When he is asked how he sees his relationship with his brother who plays in all his films, he replies “like a director full of admiration for a great actor” of whom he praises the huge talent and the theatrical career in the Comédie Française.

Versailles rive gauche, his first film in 1992 was the first part of a “trilogy of train stations” (“trilogie des gares”). Acclaimed by critics, the film received several awards (including a César – French equivalent of an Oscar – the following year) and was released in theatres where it benefited from word of mouth. This medium length film of 45 minutes set the tone of his work: in this ludicrous comedy, a young man from Versailles tries to save a night with a woman that a series of events are compromising (his flat being invaded by a horde of strangers, for instance). In 1994, another short film, Voila, in which a father brings his newly born child in the forest for him to discover nature, was noticed at the Venice Festival. Two years later, Dieu seul me voit (Versailles-chantiers), the second part of his trilogy, stars again Denis Podalydès in the role of Albert Jeanjean, a lunar character fundamentally hesitating about all his choices, even the most insignificant ones are really heartbreaking to him", who is caught between three women. The film received the César for Best First Long Feature in 1999. Liberté-Oléron, co-written with Denis, was kind of the final part of the trilogy, even though it was not about a Versailles station. It was released in 2001 in France. Denis Podalydès plays a father who is not with it and takes his family on a cruise on a dubious boat. It is soon the wreck of both the boat and the family.

In 2002, The Mystery of the Yellow Room, a nineteenth-century set production with a higher budget, was the faithful and jolly adaptation of the detective novel classic by French author Gaston Leroux. The film, starring a galaxy of great French actors (Claude Rich, Jean-Noël Brouté, Sabine Azéma, Olivier Gourmet, Pierre Arditi, Michaël Lonsdale…), was a huge critical and public success in France. The Perfume of the Lady in Black, the sequel of Joseph Rouletabille’s adventures, has the occasionally frightening depth of Jacques Demy’s tales. It can also be associated to the witty cinema of Sacha Guitry, both jolly and cruel, and cheerful Tex Avery. Thanks to the same team of playful and extraordinary actors (with, in addition, a very energetic Zabou Breitman), this last film is a true opera of colours and light, seductive dances and impenetrable nights. It pays homage to the wonders of pretence, the pleasure of fiction and the desire to believe in it. —cineuropa