En attendant Bojangles

"I didn't come out of the book or the movie unscathed. Even now, En attendant Bojangles makes me ask myself many questions about love - how far do you go for the person you love? -and also about parenthood. We talk about ourselves in a film and I myself am a father, in a long-standing relationship with a woman I love and who loves me: how would my daughter react when she was older if I got involved in the adventure? Would she equate us with these lovers? My wife reassured me: "They are not you," she explained. She allowed me to change my perception of things and to free myself from them. I understood that it was possible to tell a story through one's own prism; to make a personal work without the protagonists having to be too close to oneself. - Régis Ronsard

Adapting a best-seller is often a perilous exercise as it is necessary not to betray the original material but also to bring a real vision of a director able to transcend this work and give it life before our eyes. Certainly the new film of Régis Roinsard (Populaire (202), Les traducteurs (2020)) confirms all the good we think of this excellent director who never tries to fit into the mold of a commercial French cinema but rather to continue to offer ambitious films reminding us that the strength of French cinema is based on the richness of the actors' games totally invested and not afraid to leave their comfort zone to reinvent themselves constantly. 

After his first film, the director reunites with Romain Duris and collaborates for the first time with the best current Belgian actress Virginie Efira. The success of this film is essentially based on their duo reminding us of the golden age of Hollywood cinema, capable of astonishing the audience and capturing our attention without any dead time.

Olivier Bourdeaut's first novel, published by Finitude in 2016, was not only praised by the press and won prestigious awards (France Culture-Télérama prize, RTL-Lire prize, Emmanuel-Roblès prize and France Télévisions novel prize), but also quickly became a bestseller. It is easy to understand that a film adaptation was inevitable, as this book, after having been read, remains anchored in the memory of the readers as a world of crazy originality and marked by picturesque characters. This true love story of two very special people and their only child celebrates both the strong and unique love and the madness that will overtake them. 

It took only one evening for Camille (Virginie Efira) and Georges (Romain Duris) to meet and for their love to become a true rock. However, Camille's bipolarity and her madness will make their life as difficult as it is hectic. The birth of their son Gary will also confront them with their lifestyle in which they live unreasonably. In their world, they voluntarily live differently from the rest of the population, they invent unimaginable worlds, they refuse the normality of life, the responsibilities and they live by their own codes in which fantasy and freedom have no limits. However, Camille's reactions force Georges to lock her up in a psychiatric asylum because he can no longer cope with her unpredictable reactions. The strong love that unites this family and the important help of their friend Charles will be enough to save Camille from her own inner demons.

En attendant Bojangles is certainly one of our favorites of the beginning of the year. A new proof that Romain Duris and Virginie Efira are great actors able to move us, to make us laugh and especially able to give their characters an undeniable presence on the screen. Certainly this film will not please everyone by its slow pace and by the fact that the evolution of the story seems unpredictable and does not constantly try to please the audience. Between the song of Nina Simone Mr Bojangles that Camille listens to on a loop, the presence of a crane called Superfetatoire and a crazy inventiveness, this film stands as a certain renewal of French cinema far from the current conformism of commercial cinema that struggles to surprise.  

En attendant Bojangles
Directed by Régis Roinsard
Produced by Olivier Delbosc, Jean-Pierre Guérin
Written by Romain Compingt
Starring Romain Duris, Virginie Efira, Grégory Gadebois, Solan Machado-Graner, Orianne Daudin, Juliette Blanche
Music by Clare Manchon
Cinematography : Guillaume Schiffman
Edited by Loïc Lallemand
Production companies : Curiosa Films and JPG Films; France 2 Cinéma, Orange Studio, Studiocanal and UMedia (Coproduction)
Distributed by Studiocanal
Release date : January 2022, 5 (France)
Running time : 124 minutes

Seen on January 07, 2022 at Gaumont Disney Village, Room 5 seat A18

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