Apres Mai (Something in The Air) (Olivier Assayas, 2012): France

Reviewed by Jaclyn Marie Murdock. Viewed at AFI Fest Nov. 5th, 2012.

This semi-autobiographical story of director Olivier Assayas during the midst of 1960s rebellion, was not the easiest film to sit down and watch.  Set in Paris in 1971, just a few years after the student riots of 1968, the film follows the journey of Gilles (Clément Métayer), a young 17-year-old high school student who is a prospective filmmaker, painter of considerable talent as well as a political activist. He along with his friends, actors Felix Armand and Hugo Gonzalmann, are activists in the political arena, working to create a better society and find their place in the world.

The film, which is mainly focused on personal goals and get one’s opinons out to the masses, Assayas lacks background information on the cause that these students were fighting so incredibly hard for. This in itself for me as a huge letdown and really disconnected me from the raw and personal journey that Assayas experienced at this age. The film making also fell into this aspect.

The sets were too clean, the mostly non-professional actors (whose characters endured bombings, lack of showers, and money) were missing the dirty, worn down look one would expect if they were going through such terrible times. The actors were also missing presence on screen, they were not prominent enough to be interested in their characters progression through the film and instead take notice at the impeccable scenery behind them. Furthermore, the editing was very generic, they tried to use steadi-cam to portray a very realistic feeling but only caused more attention to go to the undefined plot. The music, being very Beatles influenced,  did not fit in well with the raw diegetic sound that was featured throughout the rest of the film. It, on top of all the other artistic elements distracted the audience from real horrible conditions there was back in France at that time. The depiction by Assayas was very simplistic and not grasping the essence of the struggles and hardships of these days.

Though this film lacked these qualities that are usually found embedded in this particular types of films, contrasting it to Across the Universe,  the message (behind the not so powerful visuals) was still very honest and empowering to teenage kids today that are struggling to find themselves in societies eyes. As well as dealing with finding something that they are passionate with and developing it over time into something that they can live off of.