LA HAVRE How Do You Say

Directed by Aki Kaurismäki
Starring André Wilms, Blondin Miguel and Jean-Pierre Darroussin

La Havre is very much a genre movie, in that the audience this film is intended for will likely find it charming, funny and appreciate its relaxed style.
But on the flip-side people who can’t jump on board with a movie of this pace will no doubt find it boring, polarising and not engaging.
The second movie in French by Finnish film maker Aki Kaurismäki, La Havre has a simple, no-frills plot that focuses on a few uncomplicated characters in the sleepy, quaint French town of La Havre. Marcel Marx (André Wilms) is an elderly gentleman, a happy shoe-shiner who earns little money but lusts after nothing more. Every night he returns to his waiting wife Arletty, whom he adores, kissing her and sitting down to a very French dinner of bread and cheese. Marcel is clearly loved in the small town, as he charms a loaf of bread from his friendly neighbour and wine from the local bar, putting it all on a tab they know he won’t pay. But as a man who takes, he gives just as much, giving every Euro he earns to his wife’s biscuit tin of savings.
One day while working on the streets he comes across a small African child, Idrissa, running from the police. Idrissa came in to France with the rest of his family stowed away in a shipping container but the French immigration officials managed to catch the container before they could exit and disappear in to the town, with only Idrissa able to escape. News of the runaway immigrant spreads fast in the port town, as police search residences and stores to find him. Possessing an empathetic and kind heart, Marcel decides to hide the boy and help him finish his journey to London, where the rest of Idrissa’s family resides.
Clean and simple editing of long, stoic shots makes this film feel like it came from a different era. In fact, if it were in black and white and not colour, you could easily assume it was. But that is where it gains charm, as the cinematography never gets in the way of the film, letting it unfold as naturally as the writing sometimes feels. It’s almost static editing leaves it with the feeling of an indie short-film, who I would most link to American Jim Jarmusch, but is also the dominating style of all of Kaurismäki’s work.
Of course, as the name might imply, the town of La Havre plays the role of a character just as much as the actors. The picturesque town has its own cast of locals, from the burly men at the bar to Little Bob, a small elderly man who is the town’s rock star. Actually I really could have done with out Little Bob, with a long, unedited scene of him performing a cover song live being a really down point in the movie. But hey, the older people in the audience seemed to really love this bizarre diversion in the film.
La Havre will find a happy home with its intended audience, but mainstream movie goers will probably be unfulfilled. Personally I found it soulful and deep, yet uncomplicated and engaging.

_TOM VARIAN