In AU NOM DE MA FILLE, Director Vincent Garenq pulls off a convincing work despite obviously limited funding resources, observable through minimal period recreation, done mostly through the use of cars.
The human element, man vs justice system, draws your interest from the outset, when you wonder why André Bamberski (superbly portrayed by Daniel Auteuil) is being arrested. A flashback of close on 30 years follows, with some parts more interesting than others, starting off in Morocco and meandering through France, Germany and Austria.
Almost constantly on screen, Auteuil delivers an immensely credible performance. He is not a good looking man, married to a beautiful woman, played by Marie-Josée Croze, who falls for the charms of a German medical doctor (Sebastian Koch, in a short but penetrating display of deception, mendacity, neighborly evil).
Sadly, Croze's part is thankless: no character development, never any explanation as to why she never questioned Dr. Krombach's decision to administer drugs and injections to her teenage daughter, clearly causing her demise - even after she had separated from the evil doctor. Other than aging convincingly, I found nothing to remember about Croze's performance.
Albeit in the background most of her on-screen time, I liked Christelle Cornil's role as girlfriend Cécile. Facially, she is not as eye-catching as Croze, but she looks like someone who enjoys life and loves with honesty. She has a most elegant figure and lovely legs, too. She stays loyal to Bamberski for many years, even though he lives almost entirely to see justice done by his murdered and raped daughter. Inevitably, Cécile runs out of patience and leaves him, and that is when a side of Bamberski emerges that suggests his justice-seeking quest may conceal a vindictive streak too: he will not have children with her. He has wasted her love and her time without any apparent remorse.
That obsession over his daughter's case clearly carries selfishness, too - not of a materialistic nature, but of the type that fails to heed the advice of his lawyer, of his father, the growing distance from his son who is fed up with his father's difficult relation with his mother, and of friends that see him losing his marbles... and a good woman to boot, whom he bafflingly refuses to have a child with.
Still, that complex vindictive facet helps explain why he contracts a trio to beat up Krombach and so see some justice done that the justice systems of Germany and France - acting in collusion to dismiss the case - keep turning a Kafkaesque blind eye to. The effects of that indifference at the top of the legal system are clear: it destroys lives and relationships as surely as the murder of an innocent teenager. And it forces one to take justice into one's hands, which the very same legal system is much quicker to act on and punish.
I liked the way Bamberski found a way to circumvent such legal callousness by getting Interpol involved, resulting in the application of the European Arrest Warrant (EAW) when Krombach illegally resumes his medical practice in Austria, which in time (much, much later) permitted his extradition.
Convincing script and dialogue, competent cinematography despite jarring narrative breaks in which the screen turns black, what stayed with me was Daniel Auteuil's superior performance, with Koch the shifty nemesis who steals his wife and his daughter's life.
Despite its flaws, AU NOM DE MA FILLE is thought-provoking and involving from beginning to end.
