Cut! : Michel Hazanavicius strikes hard for the opening of the 75th Cannes Film Festival

Of The American Class to The Artist, diversion and play on codes have always been at the center of the Oscar-winning director’s work. After a few more conventional films (The Search Where The Forgotten Prince), Cut! revives the comic ardor of Michel Hazanavicius, who manages the feat of taking over the original film without ever distorting or calming its rebellious spirit, but by granting it more French codes and a form of cultural topicality. Here, the director camped by Romain Duris (impeccable in a garish register) finds himself working for a young streaming platform. Faced with the ambient chaos that is setting in, he begins to reflect on his art, his personal ambitions which he has put aside to meet the demands of the industry (“to do fast, cheap and on average”, asserts- does it regularly). One cannot help seeing here Michel Hazanavicius making his self-criticism discreetly, he who with the OSS 117 has long supported a certain ideal of great popular comedy before being forced to temper its ardor. The portrait he paints of the artist, of his hopes and his disillusions, certainly remains one of the most beautiful surprises of this Cut!

Even beyond the meta charm of the film, we must first highlight that we laugh a lot, perhaps more than any French comedy for several months. This efficiency, it owes a lot to the irreproachable cast, in particular Finnegan Oldfield, irresistible as an odious and egocentric starlet, and Bérénice Bejo, a great regular at the cinema of Hazanavicius whose changes of attitude over the two hours offer the film some of his best moments. It’s as if the filmmaker finally let go of the horses, after almost a decade of uneven feature films, indulging in what he does best. On the one hand, pure comic writing and editing, and on the other a bit of off-roading, venturing into more regressive, even scatological terrain. Few French comedies can boast of displaying such a positive rate of successful gags.

Was it the original material that was so flawless that it could smash all cultural boundaries? Or the rigor with which Michel Hazanavicius treated him which allows Cut! to be a very successful comedy, both anachronistic and hopelessly out of its time? Each viewer will make up their own mind. But we are very happy to find here a Cannes opening film that does not look so much like an opening film, shedding its glamorous guarantee and the propriety that is required with it. We didn’t think to write it before entering the room but Cut! is really a great success.

Cut!directed by Michel Hazanavicius, with Matilda Lutz, Romain Duris, Bérénice Bejo, Finnegan Oldfield… 1h51, release on May 17, 2022 at the cinema