I love Isabelle Huppert. I would show up to watch her read the phone book or to watch her stand motionless onstage reciting what might as well be a 90 minute suicide note in a language I don't understand. And I have. And I cried like a fucking baby.
She's a genius. It makes me sick. I want to cut my hands off. What makes her characterizations exceptional in my eyes is that she refuses to romanticize anything. And that's what makes her my hero. I am someone who continually over-romanticizes everything. Like I go to buy the newspaper and it's a heartbreaking event. It is common practice in this country for actresses to milk their femininity for all its worth. Whether you're Lindsay Lohan pouting it up as a club-hopping Lolita or you're Nicole Kidman wilting away like a thorny rose, most American actresses lean heavily on the crutch of their female "Otherness".
There are a few who are inching past this: Hilary Swank by doing the drag routine in Boys Don't Cry and Million Dollar Baby, Bryce Dallas Howard turning in feral performances in The Village and Manderlay, and Annette Bening who seems to be on a one-woman campaign to land the role of a 21st century Medea with her perfs in American Beauty and the up-coming Running with Scissors.
Huppert, on the other hand, is in a league all her own. She can be subjected to massive amounts of brutal misogyny or self-inflicted torture and you won't see a flinch or hear a sigh. When she sheds her tears, they are never out of self-pity or modesty. Her eyes will moisten because she is simply feeling what its like to be alive. And living is painful. She will stare impassively at a lover or potential lover with pupils like loaded guns. Why would you act out sexual desire when its just lodged in your stomach somewhere? Huppert stands as a counterpoint to the common cinematic female. Her characters spit in the face of every over-sexed/maternal/virgin-whore that fainted/climaxed/nursed/fucked.
As the title character in Gabrielle, based on a Joseph Conrad short story "The Return," Huppert's style salvages a sinking, heavy-handed adaptation. Her virtues I've already expounded upon show up in spades. She spars with an excellent Pascal Greggory, who plays a husband she intended to leave but (in a bizarre way) defiantly returns to. The film outlines the aftermath of her return over what looked like 36 hours or so.
I thought the film was kind of sickening. Too overtly male. The would-be vilification and subsequent martyrdom of Huppert's character is magnificently thwarted by her unsympathetic performance. The filmmakers seemed intent on painting a horrific portrait of the on-going misunderstanding called "marriage" but they only succeed in individual moments never as a whole. In a blustery outburst of vanity from Greggory or a perverse snarky comment from Huppert. But, ultimately, I'm not sure what this was the story of...
Bottom Line: It's a sight to see.... An actress hijacking a movie. Luckily, she does it in better movies. See The Piano Teacher or 8 Women.
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