Chocolat Video

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Chocolat is also a kind of modern Dionysian morality tale in reverse with the Catholic church and small town narrow-mindedness as the bad guys. It gets more than a bit sappy at times, and the unrelenting celebration of outsiders and non-conformists is wearisome and sorely tried my patience throughout. However, just as is the case with chocolate with its uplifting qualities amidst the lure to overindulgence, the good surely outweighs the bad. Hallstrom is an ambitious director who is comfortable playing to an adult feminist audience. He attempts the complex and the unlikely. Here, there is more than the usual Hollywood seduction of the intended audience. There is underneath the surface a strong symbolic presence, giving the story a kind of resonating, fairy tale existence.

Chocolate of course serves as the Dionysian wine, but it is also a semi-addictive substance from a tropical American plant, the cacao, rich in sumptuous oils and theobromine, a heart and general nervous system stimulant similar to caffeine. Cocoa was the first stimulant drink to break the unrelenting hold of beer and wine on the European palate. It was quickly followed by coffee and tea. Prior to the rise of these cerebral drinks, it was commonplace for Europeans to drink beer for breakfast, and indeed to drink beer and wine throughout the day. Many believe that caffeine was a handmaiden of the Renaissance, which of course led to the eventual weakening of the hold of the Roman Catholic church. Vianne, who is the daughter of a central American mother and a European father, represents the shamanism of the New World, leading the populace away from the narrow confines of the medieval mentality with her irresistible confections made with the seed of Theoboma cacao.

The problem with the movie, and the reason it did not achieve a more wide-spread acclaim, lay not only with its cloyingly unbalanced feminist viewpoint and its anti-Catholicism, but with the difficulty Binoche (and Hallstrom) had with her complex role. Her character is a woman who wants desperately to find a place in society and to be accepted by the petite bourgeoisie while maintaining her personal sense of value (and her red shoes!). She is, in a sense, a gypsy fortune teller (recall the spinning plates) who longs to be a pillar of the community. She is worldly wise, kind and forgiving, but partly a shopkeeper with a shopkeeper's need to set down roots. She is also a Mayan princess born to wander with the sly wind that ushers her about. So, underneath all else, this is a story about finding a home. Because Vianne is frequently attacked for her lifestyle while being the sort of person who does not return insult with insult, Binoche is reduced in many scenes to a kind of tolerant, slightly superior, patient smile that becomes wearying. It is only when Johnny Depp appears that we see the real Juliette Binoche and a true indication of her ability. Incidentally Depp is excellent as a gypsy musician who understands himself and his place as a counter balance to a conservative society. He is an inspiration to Vianne because he alone is not transparent to her; she only discovers his "favorite" chocolate by happenstance after two wrong guesses. Depp also serves to save this film from the near monotony of inadequate males and dissatisfied females. When he appears I can almost hear the audience sigh.

Incidentally, you might want to compare this to Babette's Feast (1987) in which the narrow-minded and in need of liberation are northern Protestants, while the woman with the tempting goodies is an exiled Catholic chef from France. If Hallstrom had taken a clue from Gabriel Axel, who directed Babette's Feast, and followed a more objective and balanced treatment, Chocolat might have been a great movie. As it is, it is a very interesting one, and one you're not likely to forget or to feel neutral about.

Movie Review of Chocolat

Chocolat is a sumptuous feast for those with a cinematic sweet tooth. A single mother (Juliette Binoche) driven by the restless wanderlust of her Navaho mother's spirit, moves to a quiet French town with her six year old daughter and opens a chocolate shop in the middle of Lent, the Catholic fast before Easter. Her free spirited atheism enrages the sanctimonious mayor (Alfred Molina), and a battle commences for the hearts and minds of the villagers.

There is magic swirling around Binoche and her chocolatery, blurring the lines between real and unreal and giving the story the feel of a fable. However the gritty performance of Lena Olin as a battered wife keeps it from floating too far from earth. Swedish director Lasse Hallström (My Life as a Dog) once again paints a convincingly chilly portrait of small town life, aided by the capable acting of Binoche, Judi Dench and Johnny Depp in particular. Be warned, however, the real star of this movie is the chocolate. Don't go on an empty stomach or you may find yourself worryingly distracted from the narrative flow. The story is light on dramatic urgency, but the cast stirs in their own spicy fruit into the half-baked script and the result is delicious enough to satisfy the most gluttonous of appetites.

Score: 83/100

"That day, the towners not only heard a song of church, but an enlightening of the spirit," is a memorable line said late in the magical film that is Chocolat. The quote in the film kind of rings out to the entire movie - the day that you see Chocolat, it won't just be any movie, it'll be an enlightening, refreshing experience that you're sure to like.

1960, small town France. Vianne Rocher (Juliette Binoche) and her pre-teen daughter Anouk (Victoire Thivisol) move into town and open a chocolate shop just as lent is beginning. The town's small-minded mayor can't accept this and does his best to shut her down, but her warm personality and incredible chocolates manage to win over many townsfolk. Things get shaken up even more when a group of river drifters, led by Roux (Johnny Depp), stop into town (to the even greater distress of the mayor) and Vianne takes up with him. Meanwhile, she's been helping Josephine (Lena Olin) out of her abusive marriage and her equally freethinking landlord, Amande Voisin (Judi Dench) get together with her grandson, Luc (Aurelien Parent-Koeing), whose mother doesn't approve of Amande's ways.

The film is overflowing with it's share of brains and complete maturity throughout the character's hard situations. The actors all play these interesting people to absolute perfection, Juliette Binoche shines brighter than she ever has as the eager Vianne, and Judi Dench is her classical self as Armande. Also, actors that didn't get nominated for Academy Awards (Binoche and Dench did) also put in heaps of effort, Lena Olin is believable and eye-widening as Josephine and Johnny Depp as Roux...well, his coolness just goes without saying. The film has a rich and tasty feel to it, you can almost taste the chocolate Vianne is cooking, oh yes...when the cameramen allow the eye of the camera to go on the silky chocolate swishing through the cooking objects and breaking on the bowl, wow, I tell ya, you better be prepared to drool not only at the film and the chocolate, but it's ingredients and content.

Chocolat is a greatly intriguing piece of work, one that is endlessly delightful, and only contains a pinch of a fault.