Susan Granger’s review of “Bon Voyage” (Sony Classics)
Set in the city of Bordeaux during the German occupation of France in June, 1940, Jean-Paul Rappeneau’s popular, award-winning melodrama begins with an accidental death. Was it self-defense or was it murder? At the posh Hotel Splendide, a naive young screenwriter Frederic (Gregori Derangere) is so besotted by beautiful, self-absorbed movie star, Vivianne Denvers (Isabel Adjani), that he was willing to go to jail to protect her. “He once beat up a critic for giving me bad reviews,” the diva tells a journalist (Peter Coyote). In contrast, she has become the mistress of an important French government minister, Jean-Etienne Beaufort (Gerard Depardieu). Then there’s an idealistic college student Camille (Virginie Ledoyen) who’s trying to help a Jewish physicist (Jean-Marc Stehle) flee with some ‘heavy water’ for nuclear experiments so that the Nazis can’t capture the vital liquid. Everyone, in fact, is eager to escape before the imminent invasion of Paris. Despite the dire consequences of the chaos erupting around them, the characters in the four (4) credited screenwriters’ superficial, inconsistent script concentrate on shifting alliances as they plot to avoid capture. And for the French director Rappeneau (“Cyrano de Bergerac,” “The Horseman on the Roof”), this playful intrigue is very personal since he grew up during the ’40s and admits identifying with Frederic. “I see in him a bit of the young man I once was,” he’s said, noting that many details recreated in the film pertain either to the influences of his childhood or his family history. In French with English subtitles, on the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Bon Voyage” is a frantic, farcical 7. It’s a trip – particularly if you can understand French.
