THE HAIRDRESSER'S HUSBAND
A film review by Frank Maloney
Copyright 1992 Frank Maloney
THE HAIRDRESSER'S HUSBAND (LE MARI DE LA COIFFEUSE) is a French film directed by Patrice Leconte, from a screenplay by Leconte and Claude Kotz. It stars Jean Rochefort and Anna Galiena. Not rated; contains adult subject matter. English subtitles.
THE HAIRDRESSER'S HUSBAND is a very personal follow-up to Patrice Leconte's MONSIEUR HIRE (1990). This new film tells the story of a man who is obsessed from childhood with the idea of marrying a hairdresser like the voluptuous Alsatian coiffeuse who barbered and aroused him during his boyhood vacation to the seaside. Both films are about obsession, about erotic fantasy. Both films are short (89 minutes for HIRE, 84 for HUSBAND); both are economical, spare, pure, and precise in their narratives. However, whereas HIRE was cold, monochromatic, HUSBAND is warm, romantic, idyllic, intensely restrained, and full of humor and sensuality. HIRE is the dark and HUSBAND is the light; this is not to say that HUSBAND is not ultimately sad, however.
The two principals are well cast. The familiar face of Jean Rochefort (MY WONDERFUL LIFE, PARDON MON AFFAIRE, THE TALL BLONDE MAN WITH ONE DARK SHOE, and many others) is remarkable in the way it combines a merry twinkle behind its melancholy, droopy wrinkles. He is absolutely charming, utterly convincing, as the man whose happiness to completely given over to his obsession. To see him slide and windmill through the Algerian pop songs he loves to dance to is to see a man who cares only for the opinions of one other person in the whole world, a person utterly convinced of his rightness, and doomed to a great love and a terrible fate for his singlemindedness.
Anna Galiena is not only a vision of healthy young beauty, she is self-contained, mysterious, brave enough to marry and love a stranger, but not ready to be a companion to a mere friend, not quite brave enough for change.
The story line is thin, but the emotional content of HUSBAND is rich in its sensitivities and telling observations. The use of character study more than makes up for the lack of story. We really don't have to know how Antoine can live without working; he lives on love obviously. It is his love for Mathilde that is the point, not some mundane side issue of mere money. Mathilde wants to live in an unchanging world, where love is always the first rush of infatuation, where people never age, where every day is cutting hair and every night is making love in the shop. It is Mathilde's obsession, not Antoine's -- all he wants to do is live with and love his hairdresser forever -- that leads to the tragedy. The final scene is the funny-sad result -- the patient waiting for something that will never happen again.
THE HAIRDRESSER'S HUSBAND is a strange movie, a whimsical fantasy, almost a fairy tale, deeply personal, but quite approachable. It is elegantly told. It is not quite moving in the lachrymose sense, but I think it will be a movie that will stay with me for some time.
I recommend THE HAIRDRESSER'S HUSBAND. It is worth even full ticket prices.
-- Frank Richard Aloysius Jude Maloney
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