THE INNOCENT (2023) - Mark Reviews Movies

The Innocent, Janus Films

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Review by Mark Dujsik | April 6, 2023

While it may tell a story of broken hearts and a criminal undertaking, there's something wholly endearing about the characters at the center of The Innocent. The film is one that spans a few genres, with its tale of an unlikely family working through some things while a romantic comedy and a heist thriller play out alongside it, but everyone who matters here is primarily behaving because they love or want to protect someone else. It's a warm and optimistic little film that also juggles a slew of disparate ideas and characters with relative ease.

The director is Louis Garrel, who co-write the script with Tanguy Viel (as well as some collaboration from Naila Guiguet) and also stars as Abel. He's a man in his 30s, already a widower after his wife died in a car accident while he was driving, and very protective of his mother Sylvie (Anouk Grinberg), who raised him on her own. It's tough for the son, especially because his mother has a habit of falling for inmates at the prison where she volunteers as an acting teacher.

The third such relationship for her in about a decade is with Michel (Roschdy Zem), whom Sylvie marries at the courthouse, just before he's about to have a hearing for an early release from prison— shortly after explaining to Abel that she is in love with the man. Abel is convinced Michel must be up to something criminal, so he enlists the help of his best friend, by way of his late wife, Clémence (Noémie Merlant) to keep tabs on his mother's new husband.

Much of the early humor comes from Abel's general incompetence in performing this task, just as he's incapable of sticking to his convictions after Michel, who's on to his stepson from the start, enlists his and Clémence's help for the plan he's hiding from Sylvie. The plot features a few twists, especially at a roadside diner where that plan unfolds, but one of the refreshing elements of the screenplay is that none of those turns involves these characters.

We might suspect, for example, that Michel's charming ways and shows of affection for Sylvie might be too good to be true. Instead, they simply are true, and Michel really does want to provide the best for the woman he loves, just as it's true that Clémence cares deeply about her friend and Abel also wants the two most important women in his life to be safe and happy.

Garrel lets us become caught up in the sincerity of these characters' motives, the various problems and doubts they have in living up to those goals, and the hope that, somehow, things will work out as well as they can under the circumstances. The actual circumstances of the plot of The Innocent, which involves a robbery and the power of acting to get at emotional truth, are fun, too, but the foundational honesty of these deceptive but well-meaning characters makes the material really work.

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