Colette (2018)

Colette is pushed by her husband to write novels under his name. Upon their success, she fights to make her talents known, challenging gender norms.

Director:

Wash Westmoreland

Writers:

Richard Glatzer (screenplay by), Wash Westmoreland (screenplay by)

Stars:

Keira Knightley, Fiona Shaw, Dominic West

1 win & 9 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Keira Knightley	...	Colette
Fiona Shaw	...	Sido
Dominic West	...	Willy
Robert Pugh	...	Jules
Sloan Thompson	...	Matilde
Arabella Weir	...	Mme. de Caillavet
Máté Haumann	...	Count Muffat
Ray Panthaki	...	Veber
Al Weaver	...	Schwob
Virág Bárány	...	Lotte Kinceler
Dickie Beau	...	Wague
Kylie Watt	...	Opera Singer
Janine Harouni	...	Jeanne de Caillavet
Jake Graf	...	Gaston de Caillavet
Joe Geary	...	Bailiff

Storyline

After marrying successful Parisian writer Henry Gauthier-Villars, known commonly as "Willy" (Dominic West), Gabrielle Colette (Keira Knightley) is transplanted from her childhood home in rural France to the intellectual and artistic splendor of Paris. Soon after, Willy convinces Colette to ghostwrite for him. Colette, in turn, pens a semi-autobiographical novel about a witty and brazen country girl named Claudine, sparking a bestseller and a cultural sensation. After it's success, Colette and Willy become the talk of Paris and their adventures inspire additional Claudine novels. Colette's fight over creative ownership and gender roles drives her to overcome societal constraints, revolutionizing literature, fashion and sexual expression.

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Plot Keywords:

lesbian kiss | novelist | bisexuality | paris france | infidelity | 

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Taglines:

Based on a true story.

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Genres:

Biography | Drama | History

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for some sexuality/nudity

Details

Official Sites:

Official site Official site [Japan]

Country:

UK USA France Hungary Netherlands

Language:

English

Release Date:

20 December 2018 (Netherlands)

Also Known As:

Colette

Filming Locations:

Budapest, Hungary

Box Office

Opening Weekend USA:

$161,179, 23 September 2018, Limited Release

Gross USA:

$5,137,622, 29 November 2018

Company Credits

Production Co:

Number 9 Films, Killer Films, Bold Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

111 min

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Writing of the script for "Colette" began in France in the summer of 2001 under the title "Colette and Willy." Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland were planning to settle in a Paris apartment loaned by a friend, but they had the unpleasant surprise to discover once there that the housing had been rented. They had to fall back on a country house that turned out to be a fifteenth-century manor in a sorry state, without Internet or television. Totally cut off from the modern world, the duo was able to lay down a first version of the scenario in about ten days. The writing was far from over: no fewer than twenty versions of the script have emerged in sixteen years.

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Goofs

Although the characters are French, and the film is set in France, they all have British accents.

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Quotes

Colette: Did you ever feel like you were playing a part, Sido?
Sido: In what way?
Colette: As a wife. Or a mother. Like you were just going through with it.
Sido: Sometimes, as a wife. Never as a mother.

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Crazy Credits

There is a dedication to Richard Glatzer, who co-wrote the film's screenplay with Wash Westmoreland, shortly before the closing credits: "For Richard".

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Connections

Referenced in The Graham Norton Show: Olivia Colman/Nicholas Hoult/Keira Knightley/Guy Pearce/Catherine Tate/Rita Ora (2018)

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Soundtracks

Gnossienne No. 1: Lent
Written by Erik Satie
Performed & Arranged by Thomas Adès

User Reviews

COLETTE has done a credible job in moderating a timely feminist biopic with tact and insight, a film Glatzer would be proud of

A long-in-gestation pet project of the queer filmmaker-duo Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland, COLETTE has been finally green-lit after their Julianne Moore's Oscar vehicle STILL ALICE (2014), but sadly Glatzer was succumbed to ALS in 2015, leaving Westmoreland the sole director title in the final movie.

A biography of French novelist Gabrielle Colette (1873-1954), the film perceptively pares down the time frame and is exclusively bookended by the stretch when her life is dominated by her first husband, publisher Henry Gauthier-Villars, aka. Willy (West). Willy is a purported Parisian man-of-letters, intuitively sees potential in a young Colette (Knightley), whisks her from countryside to the pre-WWI bohemian capital, and encourages her to write, yet, her in-vogue novels are published under Willy's name, on the pretext that bluestocking literature doesn't sell.

Colette and Willy's marriage is a problematic union right out of the box, yet, for her, it is essential that she plays along with his games under such circumstances, there is a vague feeling that Willy's high-handed means of locking Colette up and impelling her to write has something positive to reflect in hindsight as sometimes, a writer does need some extraneous force to overcome inertia. Also intriguingly Westmoreland makes a compelling example of how their open marriage works, when Willy cunningly condones Colette's Sapphic proclivity and exploits it for the gain in Colette's inspiration for their "baby", the Claudine stories, meanwhile, his macho pride cannot allow Colette's conquest Georgie Raoul-Duval (Tomlinson) untasted by his yardstick, eloquently hits home of man's deep-seat insecurity about woman's unbridled sexual prowess.

Insidiously, Colette, once emboldened with confidence of her craft, gains her upper hand in their nuptial tug-of-war, and shifts her emotional investment to Mathilde de Morny aka. Missy (Gough), a noblewoman who has no qualms about flaunting her androgynous comportment, together they pitch in outré, cause célèbre-inflamed pantomime acts, and what remains between she and Willy subsumes into a businesslike arrangement, until he crassly sell off the only connection holding them together.

COLETTE has a meatily subversive blueprint in its subject's unorthodox lifestyle, but Westmoreland lucidly opts for a less ostentatious approach to address the central matter of gender equality, critically, Willy is not habitually depicted as a complete monster, both he and Colette, are a complex individual enriched with both foibles and oscillating emotion. Kit out in a padded suit to appear rotund, but nimble-foot if he wants to be, Dominic West gives a fantastic performance counterpoising a more resigned, less vehement, but equally gallant impersonation of Colette by a mellowing Knightley.

Arranging compositional nods to many famous belle-époque paintings, the art production makes a good fist in configuring a more restrained version of Paris basking in moral decadence and spirit exuberance, albeit allowing English to usurp French for obvious and practical reasons, which means authentic Gallicism is right at the end of the rainbow, COLETTE has done a credible job in moderating a timely feminist biopic with tact and insight, a film Glatzer would be proud of.