MA SAISON PREFERE/ MY FAVOURITE SEASON

France, 1993, 127 minutes, Colour.
Catherine Deneuve, Daniel Auteuil, Marthe Villalonga, Jean- Pierre Bouvier, Chiara Mastroianni, Carmen Chaplin, Anthony Prada.
Directed by Andre Techine.

My Favourite Season was written and directed by Andre Techine. He has a very strong reputation with dramas with a French sensibility, Girl on a Train, Wild Reeds, I Don’t Kiss, the war drama, Strayed, and the biography The Bronte Sisters.

This is a film about family, focusing on a 50-year-old woman, played by Catharine Deneuve, who has to move her ailing mother from an institution, bringing her home, her husband reluctant to have his mother-in-law, and her daughter (played by Deneuve’s own daughter, Chiara Mastroianni) and adopted son, part of the issues. She goes to visit her estranged brother, Daniel Auteuil, an erratic and edgy surgeon who comes home, interacts with his mother, agrees with her to move out from her daughter’s but fails to detect her medical condition and she dies.

The film gives the opportunity for the characters to discuss their interactions, relationships, their estrangements – including using that French device in so many dramas, the family meal.

There are some kind of move towards resolution at the end – once again with discussion and Emile. And each of the characters describing their favourite season.

Similar to many films of its kind – but well acted and thoughtful.

1. A portrait of a French family, relationships, tensions? The very French sensibility?

2. The delineation of chapters, the progress of the story?

3. Locations, homes, workplaces, meetings, funerals? The musical score?

4. The title, the final sequence, the response of each of the characters and their choices for their seasons?

5. Emilie as focus, her relationship with Bruno, the years of marriage, their daughter, adopted son? Each in their profession? Tensions, her control? The law? Her age and experience, relationship with her daughter, with her son? Her relationship with her mother, the tensions, the mother’s physical state, helping her, taking her home, her husband’s reaction, setting her up in the room, her mother talking to herself, unhappy? Trying to cope?

6. Emilie, going to see Antoine, three years absence, his life, manner, surgeon, fussy? His work and edgy? The animosity towards his sister? his relationship with his mother, her favouring him? Leading to jealousies?

7. The daughter, at home, relationship with her parents, her skill at the piano? Lucien, Antoine discovering him in bed with his girlfriend? His place at the table, critique?

8. The French device of showing meal situations, everybody present, the arguments, the consequences?

9. The mother, from the land, unable to read and write, the ambitions of her husband? Her relationship with her children? Her suffering turns, in the home, leaving with her daughter? Dissatisfied at home? The meal, with Antoine, going with him? Her having a further turn, Antoine not recognising it? Her death, funeral?

10. The aftermath of the funeral, people speaking to each other, Bruno and the separation, talking to Emilie, her response? Antoine? The children?

11. The film taking audiences inside relationships? The open ending?