From the Land of the Moon (2016)

From the Land of the Moon (French: Mal de pierres, literally "disease of the stones") is a 2016 French film directed by Nicole Garcia from a screenplay she co-wrote with Jacques Fieschi, adapted from the 2006 Italian novella of the same name by Milena Agus. It stars Marion Cotillard, Louis Garrel and Alex Brendemühl. The film had its world premiere at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival where it competed for the Palme d'Or, and received eight nominations for the 2017 César Awards, including Best Film, Best Director for Nicole Garcia, and Best Actress for Marion Cotillard.

Plot

At the end of WWII, a woman enters a marriage of convenience to a man who had shown kindness to her family during the war. Sickly from kidney stones, she travels to a fancy clinic for treatment and falls in love with a veteran she meets there. After they part, she considers whether to build a family with the man who loves her or re-kindle the lost bond with the man she loved while briefly away from home.

Cast

Marion Cotillard as Gabrielle

Louis Garrel as André Sauvage

Àlex Brendemühl as José

Brigitte Roüan as Adèle

Victoire Du Bois as Jeannine

Aloïse Sauvage as Agostine

Daniel Para as Martin

Jihwan Kim as Blaise

Victor Quilichini as 14-year-old Marc

Production

On 10 June 2014, Variety reported that Marion Cotillard would star in Nicole Garcia's upcoming film, Mal de Pierres, an adaptation of Milena Agus' 2006 novel of the same name. The screenplay was co-written by Garcia and frequent collaborator Jacques Fieschi. The film was produced by Alain Attal's Les Productions du Trésor.

The film's production budget was €10.5 million.

Release

In May 2015, StudioCanal acquired distribution rights to the film in United Kingdom, France, Germany and Australia. In March 2016, Sundance Selects acquired U.S distribution rights to the film.

Reception

Critical response

AlloCiné, a French cinema site, gave the film an average rating of 3.5/5, based on a survey of 30 French reviews.

For Time Out, reviewer Geoff Andrew commented that the film "starts fairly stodgily but then turns into something interesting, even a little unusual", a "tale of amour fou – loving the ideal of love, rather than an individual – and so Gabrielle is driven to distraction. Crucially, Garcia respects her dreams and desires, which are at odds with the mores of the time, but she doesn't romanticise the woman. The result, despite an uncertain start, is in the end a surprisingly intriguing and affecting movie."

American critics were less enthusiastic in their response. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 32% based on reviews from 56 critics, with an average score of 4.73/10. The website's critics consensus reads: "From the Land of the Moon benefits from striking visuals and strong work from Marion Cotillard, but they're both ultimately overcome by a story that drifts into wan melodrama." On Metacritic the film has a score of 40 out of 100, based on reviews from 17 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Alan Zilberman of the Washington Post said, "Moments of visual beauty only call attention to the stilted dialogue and maudlin plot that otherwise define the film." Sheri Linden of the Los Angeles Times said, "Marion Cotillard shines", but director Garcia's "lush period drama equates hyper-romance with both self-realization and delusion, a proposition that proves more muddled than illuminating."

Box office

In France, From the Land of the Moon was released to 335 screens, where it debuted at number nine at the box office, selling 283,843 tickets. It sold a total of 669,856 tickets and grossed $4,718,885 after 13 weeks in French cinemas. The film grossed a total of $6,547,983 worldwide.

Accolades

The film was nominated for several awards at the César Awards and elsewhere in Europe, including for Cotillard's performance and the cinematography by Christophe Beaucarne.

References

External links

From the Land of the Moon at IMDb

From the Land of the Moon at Rotten Tomatoes