Flat. Flatlined. No rising or falling action. No action. The plot points are barely blips in the flatness. It's discouraging to read the film website's synopsis; in fact, the reviews, too, which describe a "struggle" among the siblings, that they "remember" together about the past, that the objects represent something important, that there is conflict and resolution. The family dynamics are so slight, the reviewers' words over-describe the almost invisible events of the movie. Perhaps this is just the filmed equivalent of the Gallic shrug: to recognize their differences, however minimally, is a big struggle to the French?
The teenage invasion at the end almost redeems things, with its implications of doom (the fire, the studio, the pond) and the fresh carelessness of the new generation: stupid, willful, and yet still nostalgic.
""Summer Hours," as calm and quiet as its title, is in some ways [Olivier Assayas] most coherent and complex exploration of the current shape of the world. Don’t be fooled by the apparent modesty of its ambitions. Sometimes a small, homely object — a teapot, a writing desk, a sketchbook, a movie about such things — turns out to be a masterpiece." -- A. O. Scott, New York Times, May 15, 2009
"A movie whose true central subject is how sad it is to sell your two Corots, [but of course who could afford the inheritance tax etc.] is bewildering. Even more bewildering is the fact that Mr. Scott eats it line, hook and sinker."
-- Comment 14. New York Times, May 18th, 2009 8:27 pm. George.
"The actors all find the correct notes. It is a French film, and so they are allowed to be adult and intelligent. They are not the creatures of a screenplay that hurries them along. The film is not about what will happen. It is about them. The recent American film that most resembles this one is Jonathan Demme's "Rachel Getting Married." Some audience members didn't know what to think of it, because it didn't tell them. Sometimes you just have to figure out what you think for yourself. "Summer Hours" ends on the perfect note, the more you think about it."
-- Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times, May 20, 2009
"Lots of films are called haunting, Summer Hours truly is."
-- Peter Travers, Rolling Stone, May 14, 2009
"Parts of "Summer Hours" feel very much like real life, which is both the film's strength and its ultimate weakness. The sense of realism can only sustain this downbeat French drama for so long. After a while it feels like you're really spending nearly two hours with your squabbling siblings."
-- Jeff Vice, Deseret News, June 25, 2009
"What is most unusual about "Summer Hours" is that it is concerned about what will be left of French culture if the country's best and brightest move offshore. French films traditionally take France and its eternal appeal for granted. "Summer Hours" is the rare film that worries about that, worries about the future, and that proves to be invaluable."
-- Kenneth Turan, L.A. Times, May 29, 2009
For the real thing, see the patrimony of France and the rest of the Western World at the Musée d'Orsay
hmmmmm.
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