Albatros

After ten years together, Laurent proposes to his girlfriend Marie. It’s even going to be a white wedding. Little Poulette is all for her parents tying the knot. Group hug. While it’s all plain sailing on the family front, Laurent’s job, which he loves, is noticeably taking its toll. As chief of the local police force in the picturesque community of Étretat in Normandy, he not only has to drive inebriated troublemakers out of the bar (Xavier Beauvois in a brilliant cameo), he also has to deal with more serious crimes – from insurance fraud to child abuse to a suicidal Parisian who throws himself off the steep cliffs (ruining a romantic wedding photo shoot for the tourists who had come here from afar). When farmer Julien repeatedly defies EU regulations, Laurent finally blows a fuse. What follows is pure existentialism and the archetypal myth of a man in crisis. With Albatros, Beauvois consolidates his position as a masterful observer of the emotions (depending on social strata), notions of responsibility (and loss of control) as well as the deep-down existence of the death wish, all done with an assured sense of style and thanks to a fabulous lead in Jérémie Renier. (Berlinale)