A subtle Revenge Thriller on the Shores of Lake Geneva

Moka (2016) - Mermoud

A new French/Swiss revenge thriller, Moka, directed by Frédéric Mermoud starts with a 5-minute breezy, silent sequence of Diane (Emmanuelle Devos) sneaking out of what seems to be a hospital/wellness sanitarium near Lake Geneva. It's dark and moody and sets the tone of this slow burn, Chabrol-esque revenge thriller.

It turns out, Diane is a grieving mother whose son was killed in a hit-and-run in Lausanne, the Swiss side of the lake. Through a hired investigator, Diane narrows down the facts that the driver and the passenger, a blonde woman and her male companion, were driving a coffee colored (hence the title) vintage Mercedes. She settles on a beautician named Marlene (Natalie Baye) and her younger, womanizing boyfriend Michel (David Clavel) with the matching car living on the French side of the lake, in Evian. Diane's obsession makes her plunge head first into the lives Marlene and her family.

Diane approaches Marlene unassumingly, guising herself as a writer in seeking seclusion by the lake side. Marlene takes her as a nosy writer-type in search of inspiration and keeps her barrage of personal inquiries at arm's length at first. But she finally lets her guard down at Diane’s genuine demeanor.

She also approaches Michel as potential customer as he tries to sell the car. Diane’s aggressiveness in her interests in the car turns on Michel in all the wrong ways. After chance meeting with a good looking young drug dealer on the ferry ride, she charms him to get a hold of a handgun. And the two get romantically involved.

Diane then befriends Marlene’s rebellious young daughter Elodie (Diane Rouxel) who might have been carrying on a sexual relationship with her stepfather.

Based on a book of the same name by best selling author Tatiana de Rosnay, and relocating its setting to Lake Geneva, Moka, like its neutral colored vehicle and with its picturesque and quiet Swiss setting, is all a very subtle affair. Somberly lensed by Irina Lubtchansky (who shot two recent Anaud Desplechin films- My Golden Days, Ismael's Ghosts) against stunning Lake Geneva backdrop, the film is a handsome, brooding noir.

It is a deftly directed, low-pitched noir that heavily relies on the charm of Devos. As always, she walks the fine line between confidence and vulnerability and makes Diane's unrelenting pursuit of revenge totally believable. With quiet determination and stubbornness in her eyes, she is one of the few actresses who can turn their dowdiness into sexy.

Baye, a veteran actress, gives a fine performance as an ordinary woman dealing with her career, motherhood and relationship. Her Marlene's guarded friendliness hides her dormant venom which we get to see in a glimpse of.

It's great to see two women in their mid-career finding juicy roles that show their subtle artistry. The film hints on the fraternity of womenhood by the end. Moka is a well acted, low-key but impactful revenge thriller for the fans of neo-noir.
Top 10 Favorite Films of 2015

Violette Leduc Bio

Violette (2014) - Provost

Ever since her breakout role as a deaf office worker, Carla, in Jacques Audiard's audacious caper flick Read My Lips, Emmanuelle Devos has risen as one of the top French actresses of our time, working with auteur filmmakers such as Arnaud Desplechin and Alain Resnais and rubbing shoulders with Catherine Deneuve and Gerard Depardeu. The thing is, I can't think of another actress who made a career out of her frumpiness more successfully than Devos. And she happens to be a favorite of mine.

In Martin Provost's biopic of a post-war French writer Violette Leduc, Devos delivers another gold, again using her arguably unremarkable physical attributes as a weapon.

The film starts with Violette (Devos)'s black market smuggler days during WWII and helplessly in love with a writer/fellow boarder, Maurice Sachs in rural France. Even though Sachs is closet homosexual, lonely Violette doesn't let up throwing herself onto him. As a way of fight off her advances, he suggests her to write.

After getting back to Paris and reading the controversial feminist writer Simone de Beauvoir (Sandrine Kiberlain)'s writings, Violette, forever lonely and emotionally needy, soon gets enamored with the famous writer. de Beauvoir in turn, recognizes Violette's talent and encourages her to write on. With this, their lifelong friendship starts. Violette finds herself in de Beauvoir's circle of famous literary friends (Jean Genet, Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus among them). She even finds an admirer of her work and benevolent patron in a sensitive perfume mogul, Jacques Guérin (Olivier Gourmet).

Her first novel, In the Prison of Her Skin, based on her life in an all-girl boarding school, frankly describing her lesbian affair with another student (certain part of the book would later be adapted by a sexploitation maestro Radley Metzger as Therese and Isabelle). Her books, all based on her life stories, salacious and scandalous at the time of the release, gets recognitions later on as a trailblazer in feminist writing. She unlike many other writers, at least gets to taste her success in her lifetime. However alone in her private life, she gets to attain some inner peace that she very much deserves.

Provost (Seraphine), once again demonstrates his penchant for portraying well-rounded woman characters in his films: Violette doesn't come across as just a hysterical, extremely self-conscious woman and de Beauvoir, not as just a cold fish feminist icon. With the help of strong, down to earth performances by Kiberlain and Devos, Violette features great, undeniably human characters. Stately photographed by Yves Cape (Holy Motors, White Material, Humanité), the look of the film, spanning many seasons, is that of subtle elegance and accentuates the superb acting.

Devos is as usual, wonderful. Using her unconventional beauty and charm, she portrays a lonely woman who gets to express her insecurities and desires truthfully in writing, regardless of its consequences. Beautifully acted and executed, Violette is a great biopic that has a real heart.
VIOLETTE is Scheduled to open in NY on Friday, June 13 at Lincoln Plaza Cinema and Angelika Film Center, followed by a national release.