fantasies of a writer it does not lead to London in 1987. Philip is a famous American writer living in exile in London. His mistress regularly visits him at his office, a haven for the two lovers. There they make love, argue, reconcile and talk for hours about the women who mark their lives, about sex, anti-Semitism, literature and staying true to oneself.
Director Arnaud Desplechin brings us this film starring Denis Podalydès, Léa Seydoux and Emmanuelle Devos among others.
Criticism
In a style similar to that of Woody Allen, but in a French version, the writer Philip makes notes of his conversations with his circle of women, including his current lover, those from past times, and other good friends. Returning at night with his wife, he reviews the notes in her notebook, which will be the material for his next book.
The film is an endless sequence of conversations that alternate between the writer and the women, each of whom has a completely different personality. At certain moments reality is mixed with fantasy, which makes one doubt whether these conversations are real or a fantasy of the writer who invents these characters, capturing them in reality, with the aim of writing his book.
All of them have one point in common, and it is a certain point of instability and madness, which if they were invented could bring him problems for being misogynist or sexist. Facing his wife, they are characters that he invents in his office.
It is a film rich in dialogue, and deep in its themes and content. It is interesting to hear what women with such different experiences in life have to say, and that they have him as the only point in common. More than a writer, he acts with them like a psychiatrist. The downside of so much dialogue is that it can become saturating and tiring, since there is little action between the conversations, being more typical of theater than cinema. Saving the differences with the teacher, we have a Woody Allen-style film, French style.