It’s good to laugh at the cinema! Bernadette by Léa Domenach is absolutely hilarious. This is not a biopic of Bernadette Chirac but a rereading of the life of the former first lady of the Elysée brilliantly embodied by an irresistible Catherine Deneuve. First completely crushed her husband’s president (Michel Vuillermoz at the top) and by her authoritarian daughter (Sara Giraudeau as a odious Claude Chirac), she takes back control of her life to the greatest happiness of the viewer.
“The life of Bernadette Chirac resembles that of many women, who are just as educated as their husbands and who end up withdrawing to give them space,” explains the director who signs, with this excellent comedy, her first feature film. The gradual emancipation of the heroine offers sequences of great comedy while this scorned wife rises in the polls with the complicity of a communications chief played by Denis Podalydès.
Vitriolated portraits
We laugh heartily when Bernadette remonstrates with her husband’s entourage, expressing her predictions with a certain relevance or stealing the spotlight from the president with the help of charitable operations or cronyism with the stars. The film is at no point partisan but it paints vitriolic portraits of certain major political figures. The film makes fun of the rivalries that shake the Elysée, but never loses its benevolence in pointing out their faults.
The selfishness of Jacques Chirac, the cruelty of their daughter Claude or the duplicity of a certain Nicolas Sarkozy (Laurent Stocker, brilliant) are accentuated to give an absolutely delightful impression of a power farce. We sometimes think of Presidents by Anne Fontaine in front of this series of clever gags that Léa Domenach punctuates with a musical chorus that is as twisting as it is surprising.
Humor and respect
Whether or not one is on Jacques Chirac’s political side is of little importance in appreciating the film. Bernadette and the woman he describes. The film makes her sympathetic with a very pleasant sorority background. The evolution of Bernadette Chirac, going from cantankerous mother to fulfilled woman, provides many bursts of laughter without Léa Domenach ever showing herself to be disrespectful. There is a lot of humor but also emotion in this excellent comedy.