Director Report Card: Marjane Satrapi (2011)

2. Chicken with Plums

Co-directed with Vincent Paronnaud

Having successfully adapted “Persepolis” from the page to the screen, four years later Marjane Satrapi decided to try something similar again. In 2011, she would re-team with Vincent Paronnaud to make another cinematic adaptation of one of her comics. The big difference between “Persepolis” and “Chicken with Plums” is that the latter would mark Satrapi's live action film debut. Yet, despite the drastic change in mediums, Satrapi's second feature has quite a lot in common with her first. “Chicken with Plums” would roll out in French theaters in October of 2011, with a worldwide release following some time afterwards.

Nasser-Ali is a great violinist, living in 1950s Persia. During an argument, his wife smashes his prized violin. Nassar travels the world to find a replacement but none are suitable. No longer able to enjoy his art form, he makes the decision to die. He lays in bed and waits for death, which arrives eight days later. Over the course of that last week alive, Nasser reflects on his life, his loves, his choices. His wife and brother try to talk him out of his decision but he remains steadfast. He also sees forward into the future, to the people his two children will grow up to be. 

With “Chicken with Plums,” Satrapi continues to show her interest in memory. Just as “Persepolis” was devoted to someone looking back at their life, her second feature grapples with similar themes. If anything, this film is even more devoted to the idea of someone being lost in their recollections of the past. The line between past, present and future – between reality and fantasy – often blur. Instead of being told strictly from Nasser's perspective, “Chicken with Plums” features an omniscient narrator. Which allows for the fantastical leaps forward in time. The film even begins with the French variation on “Once upon a time,” setting up a whimsical story that resides within the mind from its first moment.

Another theme running throughout the film is the relationships between parents and their children. Nasser's own mother was a control freak, telling him who to marry and what adult life is supposed to be like. Despite her controlling nature, Nasser had a close relationship with his mom. Her death provides one of the film's most melancholy moments. Nasser's bond with his own children is harder to read. He often finds it difficult to relate to his rambunctious son. While he thinks his wife, who forces his daughter to focus exclusively on her studies, is too strict... He also makes no attempt to step in. His difficulty in relating to his kids is emphasized with a moment where, while attempting to explain his situation to his offspring, his son interrupts by farting. (Which is comical contrasted by having the same thing happen to Socrates.) Parents not entirely able to relate to their kids as complex human beings seems to be something on Satrapi's mind here.

Maybe family is just a big part of the film in general. “Chicken with Plums” also comes to reflect on Nasser's relationship with his brother, Abdi. While Nasser was shunned by his parents and at school, Abdi was beloved by teachers and their father. Yet there's no resentment between siblings, both feeling warmly towards each other. This is opposed to Nasser's own relationship with his wife, which is often embittered. They argue constantly, often debating on how to raise their children or how much money Nasser is making. If not an elaboration on more complex themes, “Chicken with Plums” is an examination of a man that has trouble connecting with anyone.

As I was watching “Chicken with Plums” last night, I found myself wondering. Nasser's connection with his violin, with his art, is so meaningful that he looses the will to live when he looses the ability to play. Yet little time was being spent on why this means so much to me... A question Satrapi intentionally holds off on answering until the movie's final twenty minutes. In a burst of storytelling, we learn exactly why that violin was so significant to Nasser. Why it was a well spring for his great abilities as an artist. The movie implies that great art arises out of a pain, heartbreak. That all great art is an expression of inner pain, a way to metabolize the trauma of our lives. Whether this is true for everyone is debatable but it's certainly true for some people.

Shoving so much of the movie's thematic meat into its last third probably shouldn't work. Yet “Chicken with Plums'” cultivation of an intentionally dream-like tone goes a long way towards making that workable. The film has a very stylized look, its visual design obviously replicated the painted quality of a comic book panel or the high-contrast visuals of Satrapi's black-and-white artwork. For example, when Nassar recalls his childhood schooling with his brother, the boys appear in pillars of light in darkened rooms. The opening shot, a pan down the picturesque streets of 1950s Tehran, deliberately set up the dream-like tone of what is to follow. In other words, Satrapi successfully leaps from animation to live action without loosing any of the eye-catching images.

She doesn't loose her eye for surrealism either. “Chicken with Plums” fills its story with fantastic day dreams. When he decides to die, Nasser imagines a number of elaborate scenarios for his own suicide, each one beautifully shot. This is far from the only whimsical take on loosing one's life. The death of his mother is followed by a plume of white smoke floating over her grave and then a meeting with a prophet-like figure. An extended sequence involves a meeting with the angel of death, who is depicted as a soft-spoken and char-skinned demon in a black hood. This follows an earlier meeting with another fantastical figure: A giant version of Sophia Loren, who smothers Nasser in her enormous cleavage. Which is a more pleasant option than the other forms of termination he imagines. 

Perhaps to show that she hasn't strayed too far from her first feature, and as the ultimate example of its surreal tendencies, “Chicken with Plums” also includes an animated sequence. It's a story the angel of death tells, about someone who took great efforts to avoid him. You will probably immediately notice this as a variation on “The Appointment in Samarra,” a Middle Eastern myth that is best known via W. Somerset Maugham. The animation in this moment recalls the puppetry inspired sequences in “Persepolis,” with a similar mix of grimness and humor. Did this animated stop-off add anything to the film? Probably not but it's fun to look at. 

Also among the fantasy sequences are flash-forwards, so Nasser can see his children's lives. His daughter's future is depicted solely in a dark and smoky room, as she plays cards. Her son's life, meanwhile, plays out as a parody of American sitcom. And it's the lowest point in the movie, a burst of shrill and obnoxious humor that jives badly with the rest of the movie's atmosphere. A phony laugh-track plays over multi-camera jokes about teenagers being into hip-hop and how fat and stupid Americans are. Is that what people in France think people in the U.S. are like? It's a moment of grotesque, overdone humor that sticks out badly among the film's more dream-like choices. 

“Chicken with Plums” is a starring role for Mathieu Amalric, who I best know as the bad guy in “Quantum of Solace.” This is a very different performance from that weaselly villainous role. Amalric plays Nasser as someone deeply committed to his own principals, even if it means alienating everyone around him. Amalric gives a layered performance, letting the audience know exactly how much of an ass Nasser can be while also making us understand he has his reasons for being this way. Amalric also has pretty strong comedic timing, managing to wring quirky laughs out of the sometimes downbeat material. 

The supporting cast has some strong members as well. Maria de Medeiros, easily best known as “Pulp Fiction's” Fabienne, appears as Nasser's much embittered wife. She also does a good job of balancing the bitterness she feels towards her deadbeat husband and the affection she has with him at the same time. She's the nagging wife type but without ever creating a caricature. Isabella Rossellini plays Nasser's mother as a demanding woman who also manages to maintain her humanity. Rossellini clearly communicates that the mom is sincerely doing what she thinks is right for everyone, even if it comes off as overbearing. Also notable is that Chiara Mastroianni, after her voice role in “Persepolis,” reappears her as the adult version of Nasser's daughter. 

“Chicken with Plums” wasn't just a personal project for Satrapi, on account of her adapting her own comic book. The story is loosely inspired by a real person, a great-uncle of her's who actually lived in 1950s Tehran. Upon release, the film was (not always flatteringly) compared to the work of Jean-Pierre Jeunet, a comparison that is not unfair as both filmmakers balance the surreal and the whimsical with grimmer facts of life. Yet Satrapi's insight in the artistic process takes “Chicken with Plums,” which otherwise threatens to be an uneven film, out on a burst of a feeling. [Grade: B+]