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Jardins en automne

  • 2006
  • 1h 55m
IMDb RATING
6.4/10
599
YOUR RATING
Georges-Henri Mauchant in Jardins en automne (2006)
Comedy

When he loses his position as a powerful government minister, Vincent is dropped by his pretty mistress and must begin life anew, without the privileges of power.When he loses his position as a powerful government minister, Vincent is dropped by his pretty mistress and must begin life anew, without the privileges of power.When he loses his position as a powerful government minister, Vincent is dropped by his pretty mistress and must begin life anew, without the privileges of power.

  • Director
    • Otar Iosseliani
  • Writer
    • Otar Iosseliani
  • Stars
    • Séverin Blanchet
    • Jacynthe Jacquet
    • Otar Iosseliani
  • See production, box office & company info
  • IMDb RATING
    6.4/10
    599
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Otar Iosseliani
    • Writer
      • Otar Iosseliani
    • Stars
      • Séverin Blanchet
      • Jacynthe Jacquet
      • Otar Iosseliani
    • 4User reviews
    • 21Critic reviews
  • See production, box office & company info
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Awards
      • 1 win & 1 nomination

    Photos55

    Mathias Jung and Muriel Motte in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Séverin Blanchet, Mathias Jung, and Muriel Motte in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Muriel Motte in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Muriel Motte in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Séverin Blanchet in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Muriel Motte in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Muriel Motte in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Pascal Vincent in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Séverin Blanchet in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Séverin Blanchet and Pascal Vincent in Jardins en automne (2006)
    Jardins en automne (2006)
    Séverin Blanchet and Otar Iosseliani in Jardins en automne (2006)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Séverin Blanchet
    • Vincent, le ministre
    Jacynthe Jacquet
    • Barbara, la balayeuse
    Otar Iosseliani
    Otar Iosseliani
    • Arnaud
    Lily Lavina
    • Mathilde, la rousse
    Denis Lambert
    • Gégé, le bistrotier
    Michel Piccoli
    Michel Piccoli
    • Marie, la mère de Vincent
    Pascal Vincent
    • Théodière, le deuxième ministre
    Salomé Bedine-Mkheidze
    • L'ex-fiancée
    Christian Griot
    • L'huissier
    Mathias Jung
    • Le chauve
    Albert Mendy
    • Le chef africain
    Muriel Motte
    • La maîtresse
    Mouna Ndiaye
    • Delphine
    Emmanuel de Chauvigny
    • Le pope
    • (as Manu de Chauvigny)
    Jean Douchet
    • Le père de l'huissier
    Jacques Amalric
    Pascal Aubier
    Jeanine Besson
    • Director
      • Otar Iosseliani
    • Writer
      • Otar Iosseliani
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

    Edit

    User reviews4

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    9/10
    Quietly humorous manual for living
    Iosseliani's Weltanschauung is one where ideology, commerce and religion are mistrusted. His language however, is not the language of despair or anger. He emphasises the importance of friendships and artistic endeavour. For him there really is a point to living and although he clearly finds typical human preoccupations absurd, there are appropriate ways to live in his world. The only really black part of the movie is a vignette at the start of the film where three gentlemen visit a coffin factory to pick their final receptacle. They all settle on the same one seemingly at the same time and then have a to-do about who will have the privilege of purchasing it. Jorge Luis Borges would be smiling. Such is the futility of competition and machismo. Those who grasp, grasp only nettles.

    In this movie we follow Séverin Blanchet playing Vincent, a cabinet minister. He has luxurious offices and is sent on ridiculous ministerial visits, we suspect he may be an agriculture minister. He opens what appears to be some pathetic petting zoo, pins a medal on a non-entity, and goes to shoot animals with an African potentate. His favourite knickknack in his lavish gilded offices is a back scratcher, which bears an uncanny resemblance to an item in Ingres' famous portrait of Napoleon, only there as a symbol of state held as a sceptre, the allusion is perhaps intentional, and shows the ministerial position in an absurd light. Perhaps if Iosseliani did a movie with Napoleon in, he would have Napoleon get up and scratch his arse after Ingres had finished a session.

    Notre cher ministre signs whatever papers he is given without looking at them. At one point he ignores an appointment in order to play some elaborate form of solitaire with his assistant, whilst a visitor waits in an antechamber. He even has a bench press set up for when he's really at a loose end. Eventually his resignation is forced, he is made a scapegoat out of, and his materialist wife leaves him for a more senior mandarin who doubtlessly will fulfil her burgeoning desire for baubles, gewgaws, fashionable clothes and pretentious statues. This is portrayed to us as the best thing that could happen to him. He spends more time with his friends, getting drunk and chinwagging, meeting old flames, finding new flames, playing the guitar. These scenes take up a large proportion of the film. It's difficult to describe this section, except that it's a manual on how to live. Red wine, the company of scoundrels, good eating, carousing, spending time with the angelic nieces, planting trees etc.

    This is not the most practicable advice say to a denizen of the chaotic comfortless Europe of the Dardenne Brothers. It helps to have well-heeled family members, inheritances and privileges in this film. Gardens in Autumn doubtlessly plays very well to the high bourgeois close to retirement. However even a quarter-life steppenwolf such as myself can take solace that someone else out there is aware of the ridiculous commodification of life, the banality of officialdom, the futility of grasping ambition and the meaninglessness of materialism. A peaceful park bench, tapering rays of light, a little rustling waltz of dry leaves, and a hipflask offer more than the purse of Mammon can hold.

    The last images of the film are shots of rustling autumn trees, not soon until the leaves drops, Carpe Diem is the message! One thing that I forgot to say and which is truly ludicrous, but is reflexive to the message of the film, is that Iosseliani has Michel Piccoli playing Vincent's mother. He's just enjoying himself, and the happiness rubs off.

    There's a Georgian nod in here from ex-pat Iosseliani with some Pirosmani prints or reproductions on the walls of various apartments (a primitive Georgian artist of whom director Giorgi Shenegalaya made a masterpiece biopic).

    William Lubtchansky did the cinematography for this movie, his credits are a litany of great movies of the last forty years, working with Rivette, Garrel, Godard, Varda, Straub, and Lanzmann, no fool in other words. So the film is shot well. At one point Vincent is returning to his flat, which he hasn't visited since becoming monsieur le ministre, he is clearing out his room and flings open the shutters to let some light in, this opens up to us the placid image of a young woman serenely dressed in a cloud of white at her writing table in the building across the way. Really there was thought put into the imagery here.

    This movie played almost nowhere in 2006, in the US I think it was limited solely to the New York Film Festival. And it's still played pretty much nowhere. I had to make a pilgrimage to London to see it as it wasn't showing in the regions. At least a small bunch of us folks remember it and were comforted by the wonderful Gardens in Autumn.
    helpful•14
    2
    • oOgiandujaOo_and_Eddy_Merckx
    • Jan 16, 2009

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    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • September 6, 2006 (France)
    • Countries of origin
      • Italy
      • France
      • Russia
    • Language
      • French
    • Also known as
      • Gardens in Autumn
    • Filming locations
      • France
    • Production companies
      • Pierre Grise Productions
      • Cinemaundici
      • Cinema Without Frontiers
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

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    • Gross worldwide
      • $599,879
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Technical specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      1 hour 55 minutes
    • Color
      • Color
    • Sound mix
      • Mono
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

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