THETHE BIG WAGON
Type: cinephile comedy
Direction: Philippe Garrel. With Aurélien Recoing, Francine Bergé, Louis Garrel, Esther Garrel, Léna Garrel, Damien Mongin, Mathilde Wei
Perhaps the last of the great architects of the Nouvelle Vague, the seventy-four year old Philippe Garrel with The Big Dipper he signed a film that would have been called testamentary (and perhaps it is) if it weren’t for the fact that it has the lightness and joy of comedies.
The mature manager of a puppet theater called “Le Grand Chariot” has always involved his three children in his business (Louis, Esther and Léna Garrel, the director’s three real children), but when he dies the partnership breaks down and the company risks disappearing.
Louis Garrel and Damien Mongin in “The Big Dipper.”
The new generations want to follow different paths from those of their fathers and the film not only accepts it but also ends up encouraging change, demonstrating that they will not necessarily face failure: Garrel the father knows very well that the cinema he has stubbornly pursued for years has increasingly limited spaces today and he leaves as a legacy to his children the invitation to new experimentsto new adventures, in a sort of handover without regrets or melancholy.
Who also knows how to convey to the public the hope that cinema will be able to continue its path by renewing itself.
For those who continue to believe in the cinema of authors.
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