On Feb. 12, 2012 at 7 p.m. in Hull Audito rium, the French Film Festival had its fourth entry: "Potiche" ("Trophy Wife"). Associate Professor of French Dr. Wade Edwards pre sented the film as the only straight up and down comedy of the festival to an audience as full as the auditorium could comfortably bear. The film was also the festival's only R-rated entry, something the presenter hoped would be a lot of fun.
"Potiche" revolves around Suzanne Pujol, the wife of umbrella magnate Robert Pujol. Robert is a belligerent spouse and frequent cheater in 1977 France where women still hold little of the power, and Suzanne sim ply submits. When a strike breaks out at the factory, Suzanne has to take the power from her husband, and while enlisting the help of her former lover, the union liaison Babin, she discovers her own abilities. Though her husband and daughter eventually oust her, Suzanne is not daunted. She ends up run ning for Babin's position under the farcical "Sans Etiquette" party and wins.
Complete with strange, spontaneous mu sical numbers and the charming personality of Filipina politician Imelda Marcos, Mme. Pujol is an oddball character. She is trusted mainly because of her strange front of in nocence and roundabout intelligence with communication. In short, she is a parody of almost every powerful, rich woman in his tory.
However, this movie is as much about the act of sex as it is about gender. This is made clear by the actions of two squirrels in the first five minutes of the film. Char acters talk about sex, imply sex, have sex and learn to rely on more than sex for a fulfilling life. It is almost as though this is seen as part of the spirit of the ‘70s along with emerging feminism.
Observer Katie Vaughn said she enjoyed the film and talked about how it connected with her readings on "women … in subordinate conditions" in her history class. She found the connection very interesting along with the theme of rising women. Vaughn also com mented that her favorite character was Suzanne's son Laurent. She thought it was good how he was inspired by his mother and thought it would be nice "to have the opportunity to work with [her] mom."
Already the attendee of two festival movies, Vaughn has had an enjoyable experience started by her need for credit in French 201. She said, "I recommend people come to these, even if you don't know French, because you don't need to because of the subtitles. I think peo ple would enjoy it."
Edwards said he liked "Potiche" but found it to be a little uneven. He said of the film, "Sometimes it would be really funny and it would be kind of touching and then sometimes the jokes wouldn't work." However, Edwards admitted that some jokes may have fallen flat simply because they appeared unfunny to an Ameri can audience.
As a slapstick comedy, Edwards said the film worked mostly off of telling the future. "From this vantage point," he said, viewers could "already know how things would turn out." However, he said in the '70s, "if she had a different lover every week … I don't think they'd be able to joke about it." Edwards also talked about the last film on Tuesday, Feb. 14 and said it was going to be "really good."
Anyone interested in commenting on the French Film Festival of 2012 can do so at blogs.longwood.edu/film festival.
