Looking For Hortense – Review

2nd September 2013

Kristin Scott Thomas doesn’t star in a comedy that’s not actually a comedy.

Professor of Chinese business practices Damien (Jean-Pierre Bacri) finds himself in a bind. He has promised his wife Iva (Kristin Scott Thomas) that he will get a visa application sorted for one of her relatives. This means meeting up with his father (Claude Rich), a successful lawyer who Damien seems to have a fractured relationship with. Probably because his father/Claude Rich is quite irritating. Despite that being the overall plot conceit running through the film, the matters which concern writer/director Pascal Bonitzer are the relationships between the family members. Indeed, the ‘Hortense’ of the title becomes becomes conspicuous in his Waiting for Godot absence.

Damien and Iva’s marriage is near collapse. Iva, an avant-garde theatre director, is having an affair with her leading actor. Damien’s eye begins to wander toward the fascinating and vulnerable Aurore (Isabelle Carre). There’s the three generation wide father-son issues. Despite a thin layer of affection between Damien and his father the men two men clearly know little about each other. This is notion more obvious than in the scene where Damien’s father, very annoyingly ask a Japanese waiter to read out the full name of his favourite desert whilst repeating it back with a gleeful annoyance that’s very annoying. I didn’t care for this actor. Can you tell? Damien then realises that his father may be gay which leads to a somewhat odd tangent later on when Damien spends a night with the same Japanese waiter. It really seems to come down to how open people should be with their affections. Damien is unsure how strict to be with his increasingly brattish son. How forward should he be with Aurore. How up front should he be with his wife and their failing marriage?

Oh yes this is all supposed to be a comedy according to British publicity. Well it’s a comedy in the sense that people get confused a lot by other people’s actions and get angry. The go-wide eyed or even narrow their eyes and swear a bit. If Looking for Hortense is a comedy, my my is it gentle. Looking for Hortense plays closer to a Haneke style drama with a lighter touch. Bawdy comedy this ain’t. You may have also noticed from the amount of times I mention ‘Damien’ and how little ‘Iva’s name pops up that Kristin Scott Thomas isn’t really the main focus here. She puts in yet another faultless performance – she really does get better with age – but her role comes across as secondary at best. So once again the misleading marketing companies strike.

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