30/05/2022 - CANNES 2022: Nicolas Bedos proves that playing shady in the sun might be hazardous to your health, your love life and your criminal record

In the colourful company of a handsome cast perpetrating some dirty and, at times, downright rotten deeds in posh Riviera milieus, Nicolas Bedos’ Mascarade [+see also:
trailer
interview: Nicolas Bedos
film profile] feels right at home at the tail end of the Out of Competition section of the 75^th Cannes Film Festival, offering a bumpy weekend joyride, best experienced with seatbelts firmly fastened.

“The French Riviera is a sunny place for shady people,” reads the opening caption, courtesy of author W Somerset Maugham, who had first-hand knowledge of the sceneries himself back in the day. Cut to current, still highly lavish, Riviera sceneries bathed in the glorious sunshine, with people possessing various degrees of considerable riches lolling about. In a gorgeous hotel suite, a young man is preparing a sizeable money transfer while a young woman in a casual state of undress goes to answer a knock on the door. A visibly upset middle-aged man appears, a gunshot is heard off screen, then a close-up of a shoulder wound. Cut to a courtroom, vividly animated, as accusations regarding various degrees of deception and deceit are exhibited.

Cut again, to the start of it all and what the hell went on here. We’re at the opulent home of once-great French actress Martha Duval (Isabelle Adjani, still great), her formerly grand status tainted by time and increasing thirst. Again, we meet the young man from the opening shot, whose name is Adrien (Pierre Niney) and who is part of Martha’s staff. While he doesn’t have a proper salary, he does get some good pocket money and also some nice clothes, all in exchange for assorted services attributed to the gigolo profession (which Adrien endures by simultaneously watching film scenes of the young Martha/Adjani). At one of Martha’s soirees, Adrien meets the young woman from the opening scene, Margot (Marine Vacth). Although sparks fly pretty much immediately between the two, they are equally pragmatic when it comes to the poor financial prospects of a deeper liaison. A cunning plan in devised, aimed at two pushovers with sizeable bank accounts. Martha is Adrien’s sitting duck, while Margot soon spots her perfect pigeon in Simon (François Cluzet), a broker of crème-de-la-crème Riviera real estate, who later will knock on that hotel door, visibly upset. And so begins the masquerade, as we may or may not have seen it played out before, and during which there will be crimes, heartache and even blood along the way.

Light in tone but with some decidedly cynical moments, a Hollywood-like extravaganza that Hollywood would unlikely be able to make, Mascarade and its grand ensemble – also including Laura Morante, Emmanuelle Devos, Charles Berling and James Wilby in other, savoury key parts – serves up a succulent spread. Fans of Bedos’ previous work, most notably La Belle Epoque [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Nicolas Bedos
film profile], will certainly want to keep up with this elaborate raconteur in the years to come.

Mascarade was produced by France’s Les Films du Kiosque, with co-production by Orange Studio, TF1 Film and Pathé (also in charge of its international sales).