How to end up alone…

Stephane Brizé’s Not Here to Be Loved is a well put-together tango film with a somewhat predictable plot. The entire film motors along on the strength of Patrick Chesnais in the lead role and the music. Chesnais’ acting is powerful, we’re convinced from the start that he’s incapable of really expressing his desires and his affections for those around him just as his father—who he regularly visits at a nursing home—is. Chesnais’ relationship with his own son in turn is of the same genre. Chesnais has taken over his father’s business as a bailiff and his son in turn has joined him at the office. The work is dreary and often heart-rending and Chesnais does it without a flicker of sentiment. Then one day he walks into a tango lesson. The romance begins. It moves on. For more than three-fourths of the film Chesnais and the female lead Anne Consigny pull us with them. But in the end too many well-placed cues lead the viewer right where one would expect and the film loses its freshness.

As a director Brizé has extracted phenomenal performances. He has escaped the biggest obstacle along his way, that of making a tango film that was a different tango film. But as a scénariste and story-teller he could afford to turn the heat up a little and make the plot more compelling. In his next film he shouldn’t be afraid to try it because with Not Here to Be Loved he’s shown he has the rest of the pieces in place.

The film shows again at Walter Reade on Monday March 13 @8:45 and Wednesday March 15@6:15.