Director: Rebecca Zlotowski
Writers: Anne Berest, Rebecca Zlotowski, Gaëlle Macé
Stars: Jodie Foster, Daniel Auteuil, Virginie Efira
Synopsis: The renowned psychiatrist Lilian Steiner mounts a private investigation into the death of one of her patients, whom she is convinced has been murdered.
A common trope that runs through the vast history of cinema is the investigator who just cannot seem to halt their curiosity. Now, this behavior makes sense when the protagonist is an actual detective on a case, but often, we are placed in the shoes of someone who could, if they simply chose to, leave well enough alone and go back to their own life. Some truly great films, including Rear Window, Zodiac, and Blue Velvet, fall directly into this category. All of these protagonists could have lived a normal life, and all of them with willing romantic partners. But then again, it wouldn’t leave us with much of a movie.
Rebecca Zlotowski’s enjoyable, if uneven, A Private Life certainly dives headlong into this well-worn trope, along with some darkly funny moments. However, thankfully, there is a bit of a different and more intimate angle at play. Lilian Steiner (Jodie Foster) is a psychiatrist with a full slate of patients, along with her own troubled relationships. Foster, it should come as no surprise, handles a difficult role with ease, so much so that it is easy to forget that she is not a native French speaker. Despite the difficulties of performing in a second language, she manages to convey not only necessary emotionality, but her performance of silence speaks volumes, allowing us subtly inside her character’s heart.
Almost immediately following her introduction, Lilian’s patient, Paula Cohen-Solal (a beautifully measured Viginie Efira), has died from a drug overdose. Worse, it is a drug that was prescribed by Lilian to help her sleep. This inciting incident is the perfect beginning for an exploration into not only this death (murder?), but also into the psyche of Lilian, herself. After attempting to attend the wake, after an odd invitation from Paula’s daughter, Valérie (Luàna Bajrami), she is kicked out immediately by the grieving husband, Simon (Mathieu Amalric). Strangely, this leads later to an odd emotional reaction from Lilian.
Lilian cannot stop crying. Well, crying may not be the right word. She claims to feel nothing, but one of her eyes seems to literally leak tears. And this is doubly odd, seeing as how she is closed off in many ways, especially towards her son and grandchild. Watching Foster, as a therapist who cannot control her emotion, is truly a gift. Her frustration, masking possible real emotion, is something I could watch for hours. In order to “treat” this sudden affliction, she visits her ophthalmologist, who we soon learn is her ex-husband, Gabriel (Daniel Auteuil). At first, they seem like a strange match (or ex-match, anyway), but watching them together for the rest of the film, it becomes clear that their bond, even if no longer romantic, is one to last a lifetime. The two performers match each other perfectly, seeming completely in sync, even when disagreeing on screen.
One of the things they disagree on, of course, is what really happened to Paula. There is nothing quite so unmooring for a therapist as losing a patient who showed no signs of suicidality.
Frankly, this film might have been better off staying the course, and avoiding some strange subplots that evoke fantasy and magical realism. It is never uninteresting, but Lilian’s visit to a hypnotist, copying a patient who is threatening to sue her after not being cured of nicotine addiction, wants desperately to delve into both Lilian and Paula’s shared connection without doing the necessary work to make it truly effective. It should be noted, however, that these sequences are some of the most exciting visually, buoyed by Zlotowski and cinematographer George Lechaptois’s use of deep color and subtle camera movement.
A Private Life takes a wild amount of twists and turns, some interesting, some nonsensical, and some both of the above. However, given that we are allowed to watch Jodie Foster, one of our great actors, traverse these bends in the road makes the film easily worth every minute of its runtime. Sure, it could have used a more focused throughline, but following along with this jagged mystery is rewarding all on its own.
