Lorna Irvine reviews 'a fun, yet thoughtful and nuanced work'.
Formidable! Nobody does screwball comedy quite like the French, but this film by director/actor Guillaume Gallienne is more noteworthy than most, adapted from his one-man show. Playing younger versions of himself—from hapless teen to more assured adult—and his own mother, this could very easily have been a self-indulgent monstrosity. However, there is so much understated charm and eccentricity, along with a self-deprecating sense of the absurd in every scene, that you can't help but fall in love with it.
Gallienne, initially addressing an empty theatre, is an effeminate fantasist with a severe mother complex which stifles his emotional development. Everybody assumes he is gay as he loves to emulate female gestures and dress in women's clothes. Neither parent gives him the love he needs, ignoring him or, in his father's case, suppressing his impulses by buying him masculine clothing. When he is sent off to boarding school in London, this is only the start of his trouble, including a series of inappropriate counsellors, health treatments and thwarted attempts at romance. His sexual confusion grows more complicated as he ages.
He has a 'tignasse' of wild hair, framing a face which is so expressive he could be a silent movie star. Occasionally, he resembles Buster Keaton or Dustin Hoffman in the classic transvestite comedy Tootsie. This only augments the humour, which veers from broad to subtle with subtexts of aching pathos. Andre Marcon and Francoise Fabian provide excellent supporting roles as, respectively, cruel Pere and brittle but loving Babou, equally complex characters with their own issues, and Charlie Anson as best friend and first crush Jeremy toys with and hurts him.
But what is most intriguing about Me, Myself and Mum is the questions it raises—how much influence do parents have in shaping identity, particularly with regards to sexuality? Who defines such parameters in the first place? It is refreshing to see such a fun, yet thoughtful and nuanced work, which wrong-foots the viewer at every turn and is ultimately really rather moving. A post-modern 'plaisir'.
Me, Myself and Mum (Les Garcons et Guillaume, A Table!) (15) Dir: Guillaume Gallienne, 2013.
At the GFT until December 18th. www.glasgowfilm.org
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