La disparue de Deauville (2007)

Director:

Sophie Marceau

Writers:

Sophie Marceau (scenario) &
Gianguido Spinelli (scenario) ...

Release Date:

23 May 2007 (France)

Genre:

Crime | Drama

Plot Keywords:

Deauville | City Name In Title | Cliff | Palace | Normandy

Cast

Christopher Lambert	...	Jacques (as Christophe Lambert)
Sophie Marceau	...	Victoria / Lucie
Nicolas Briançon	...	Camille Bérangère
Simon Abkarian	...	Pierre
Robert Hossein	...	Antoine Bérangère
Marie-Christine Barrault	...	Mélanie Bérangère
Judith Magre	...	La duchesse
Marilou Berry	...	Fred
Magali Woch	...	Constance
Jacques Boudet	...	Le commissaire Penaud
Laure Duthilleul	...	Marilou
Firmine Richard	...	L'infirmière en chef
Samir Guesmi	...	L'étudiant en médecine
Valérie Tréjean	...	Chloé Renard
Georges Benoît	...	Le réceptionniste Georges

Also Known As:

Trivial (International: English title)

Runtime:

Argentina:103 min

Country:

France

Language:

French

Color:

Color

Certification:

Argentina:13

Company:

Illiade et Films

Dead but keeping everyone busy

"La disparue de Deauville" (retitled "Room 401" in my country, not an improvement) is the second movie directed by Sophie Marceau. The cop Jacques (Christophe Lambert) has spent six months in the care of a psychiatrist after the death of his wife. With this history of mental instability, nobody takes him serious when he believes that an actress who died over 30 years ago has asked him to help and solve a case. All on his own, he follows the footsteps of Victoria (Sophie Marceau herself) which lead to the wealthy Bérangère (80 year old Robert Hossein, screen legend from 'Angélique' days) who is believed to have committed suicide.

Well done genre movie that plays around clever enough with the living, the dead, and especially the presumed dead - it's not macabre, more in a mystery way, yet providing explanations for everything seemingly supernatural. Stylistically, it has wild moments with subjective camera, following a protagonist declared insane, but it also falls into the trap to show off its budget sometimes, for example there is a helicopter shoot of a car driving across a bridge which is really telling us nothing except what a nice bridge that is and "hey, we had a helicopter!". That surprised me a bit for a director who must have learned a lot from artists of 'cool' like Zulawski from her works as an actress? Anyway, the movie is very entertaining, has a great cast and I can well recommend to check it out.