Wednesday, September 24, 2014
It rained last night and early this morning, so there was some question in my mind about whether the excursion to Cannes today would take place. I brought my umbrella and a sweater --the temperatures have dropped, perceptibly, since Monday-- and walked to the ticket office to get the last word on the sailing.
"The ship will go, the captain has indicated he will sail at the usual time, 9:15 a.m.", the woman at the ticket counter --who has gotten to know me by now-- assured me. "It may be cloudy in the morning, but it should clear in the afternoon."
I arrived at the embarkation point, as is my custom, early. Being the first there did not make me the first to board, however: there was a group of elderly Austrians in bright-colored and expensive sailing gear, led by an enormous Frenchwoman speaking German, who got on first. I headed for the top deck to escape the crowd, and the boat's crew let slip the ropes.
The sea was not as rough as on yesterday's brief ride to Saint Tropez, but once we were on the open sea the swells would abruptly peak --and fall. At first, my compatriots on top deck laughed it off, but there was no let up. To try to keep myself from sliding off the bench I was sitting on when the ferry lurched, I gripped the rope that divided the passenger area from the wheel and the captain, but it was no help. I found I could grip the underside of the plastic bench with my left hand, and hold my position, so I did that for the rest of the two hour trip.
I have been sick to my stomach at sea, very sick, in fact. A dramamine patch administered two days before a long sea voyage now makes travel by sea comfortable for me. However, I did not have even dramamine tablets for this trip, and after an hour at sea and no respite from the swells, I began to wonder how long I could hold out before seasickness overcame me. In my mind, I heard myself saying, J'ai le mal de mer --je vais vomir-- to the crew member sitting among us on the upper deck.
At first, I thought I was the only one under the weather. A glance at the faces of my fellow travelers, told me I was not: the joking, smiling Austrians were now keeping their lips firmly closed, all conversation ended. When we got into Cannes harbor the boat slowed down and the violent rocking subsided. Lively conversation began again, everyone relieved the morning's journey was at an end.
I wanted to see Cannes because I thought that with the yearly film festival being perhaps the most prestigious international film competition short of the Oscars, Cannes would have lots --perhaps too much-- of its economy devoted to the movies. I could not have been more wrong. There is no museum devoted to filmmaking of any kind. There is no art museum, except for a museum of primitive art. The only other public attraction is the aquarium.
Cannes is, however, a very fashionable city. It is the first city I have been in in the south of France where the locals dress with dash and style. Even on a cloudy day like today, the women and men were well-turned out, in general. The Croisette, the promenade along the sea, allows strollers to take in the many sailboats in the harbor. Indeed, this week there is an international regatta, and a stretch of stands selling sailing clothes. The presence of one boat's young crew all dressed in traditional Breton caps and linen smocks posing for a professional regatta photographer excited the attention of daytrippers: "Snap! Snap! Snap!" too, went their cameras.
I walked on, having decided that, as the day was overcast and cool, the best way to spend my time in Cannes was to go to the movies --and Cannes does have a lot of movie theaters, with the first day a movies plays in France being Wednesday --not Friday, as in the United States. So it was my luck that the new biopic about couturier Yves Saint Laurent was about to have its first showing in Cannes at 1:10 p.m., forty minutes and an easy walk away.
How was the movie? Well if you have no interest in fashion or Saint Laurent and especially haute couture, it's not for you. The film is mainly the story of the years this fragile man with a febrile imagination descended into his own private hell, a hell he never really escaped. Gaspard Ulliel impersonates the designer as he was in the days when he was at the height of his fame and cultural influence, opening ready-to-wear boutiques under the Rive Gauche label, posing nude (discreetly) for advertisements for his men's cologne, taking his influence from street fashion --safari shirts, military jackets --and, a break with everything that came before-- a pant suit inspired by men's tuxedos, which he called le smoking.
The film spends little time explaining any of this, as most of it is devoted to Saint Laurent's self-destructive relationship with J.J. Bascher, a gay libertine.. Saint Laurent almost killed himself --and his longtime partner in business and love, Pierre Bergé-- before both were free of him. However, Saint Laurent's self-destruction --several packs of cigarettes a day, lots of scotch and still, pills-- ravaged him physically. He retired from designing in 2002, becoming increasingly reclusive. He died of brain cancer in 2008.
The first showing was well-attended, but the queue for the second, which I passed, was very long. The line was full of women who take great care in their appearance in the way Saint Laurent's mother did, discreetly but expensively. These were the women for whom Saint Laurent first designed, before he became interested in playing with fashion's codes by putting women in pantsuits, by designing transparent black blouses to wear with them, by updating styles from the 1920s through the 1940s. The graphic scenes of group sex and the frontal nudity may be too much for them. Perhaps like me, they wanted a celebration of a brilliant and tormented craftsman, not a study in decadence.
Perhaps to underscore that aspect of Saint Laurent's life, the director, Bertrand Bonnello chose, for the role of Saint Laurent in his last, withdrawn years, the Austrian actor, Helmut Berger. The women on line might remember Berger's performance in a film equally scandalous in its day, Luchino Visconti's,The Damned, made in 1969. When released, The Damned received an "X" rating from the Motion Picture Association of America. Berger perfectly mimics the aged Saint Laurent's halting speech, with its stops and starts and pauses for breath, as well as his mental abstraction.
A moth batting its wings relentlessly towards the flame, almost burning himself out, then withdrawing --just enough-- to do it again. Until the wings could beat no more. Saint Laurent's life could have been brought to the screen in this spirit. But --as an eighth grade teacher of mine used to say, "We live in an age where we like to see the feet of clay of our idols." So Saint Laurent serves them up, eclipsing the man's accomplishment in the process.
***
The trip back was uncomfortably cold, and my impressions of the film I had just seen dominated my thoughts. My head ached when I descended the boat. I was glad to return to little Saint Maxime for my last evening here and a hot shower.
No comments:
Post a Comment