Film Review | Potiche

Director: Francois Ozon
With Catherine Deneuve, Fabrice Luchini


François Ozon is a gifted, versatile filmmaker capable of turning his hand to any number of genres with considerable élan. He dealt with a tragically crumbling marriage in 5x2, played out a musical comedy murder-mystery in 8 Femmes and Ricky was a strange fantasy about a baby that develops wings.

He also gets France’s best actors to work for him, so seeing Catherine Deneuve as a put-upon 1970s potiche (it means decorative vase but in this context means “trophy wife”) in his latest comedy satire makes perfect sense.

Deneuve is Suzanne, the oppressed wife of a factory owner Pujol (played with super smarm by Fabrice Luchini) who believes that women’s opinions should be kept to themselves. This is the era of open sexism, both in the workplace and at home. But when the workers at the umbrella factory turn on their boss and threaten to strike, it’s Suzanne that gets the call to quell the furore and lead the workers. A new career beckons, it seems, perhaps even in the political arena…

Visually, the film has a look of a Jacques Demy musical (The Umbrellas of Cherbourg – get it?), and the 1970s period touches are spot-on. But it’s the screwball script and top turns by the like of Deneuve, Gérard Depardieu as the union leader with whom Suzanne had a distant affair and Jeremie Regnier as Pujol fils that make Potiche come alive.

A great little film for a quiet night in this autumn, Potiche has just been released on DVD.

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Monday, 17th, October by Katharine Barrau