Chocolat (2000)

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Watching Chocolat is like eating old Halloween candy on Christmas nauseating. Here is a film that deals with racism, wife battering, and the perils of conformity, but treats these grave social ills as touching comic fodder. Director Lasse Hallström, who has always had a dangerous tendency toward the saccharine, directs with sledgehammer subtlety and completely wastes the acting talents of Juliette Binoche, Johnny Depp, Lena Olin, Judi Dench, Alfred Molina, and everyone else who chose to star in this shameless, pandering movie.

The sickly sweet story is about Vianne (Binoche) and her daughter Anouk (Victoire Thivisol), who arrive in the small French village of Lasquenet. In this quaint locale, a narrator informs us, tranquillité is the most sought after state of being, and knowing your place is the most important way to live your life. Though the pair arrive virtually empty handed and seemingly penniless, they nevertheless find the money to rent and refurbish a rundown pastry shop for the delectation of the villagers. Many of the church going, conformist townsfolk are suspicious and even visibly irritated by the new interlopers, but our plucky patisserie proprietress, of course, refuses to let this get her down.

After this less than promising opening, Chocolat proceeds, with no originality whatsoever, to tell the story of how Vianne comes to win over various members of the citizenry and enrage others. There’s the tragic Josephine Muscat (Olin, whose career has seen better days), who moves into the chocolate shop after her husband, Serge (Peter Stormare from Dancer in the Dark) brutally beats her. There’s the requisite old lady character Amande (Dench, trying her best with an insipid role), who stops by daily for a cup of cocoa and to tell her tale of woe. The comely chef’s concoctions also reinvigorate a passionless marriage and bring together a couple of old codgers.

Chocolat would not be complete without an antagonist, however, so up pops the Comte de Reynaud (Alfred Molina) to rail against the irreligious unwed mother and her sinful sweets. On his side, he has his secretary Caroline (a demure Carrie Anne Moss), the local pastor Henri (Hugh O’Conor), Josephine’s spurned husband Serge, and a group of indistinguishable inhabitants from the town. When a band of roving Irish gypsies arrive, led by the rascally Roux (Johnny Depp, sporting braided hair and an intermittent Irish accent), a full on war develops as the xenophobia of the iniquitous Count and his band of followers comes to the fore.

So far, so tolerable, right? Well, not exactly, because Chocolat is completely rotten at its core. The terrible behavior towards Vianne and Roux that Reynaud encourages is so loathsome that the turnaround of some of the characters at the end carries no weight. Bigotry and spousal abuse are serious matters, and though the jaunty jig music in the movie’s score might convince some viewers that they’re watching a lighthearted romantic comedy, it’s a pernicious trick.

There’s a scene that is revoltingly played for laughs where Serge attends a grade-school catechism class as a means of redemption for beating his wife. Ha, ha. Another dismaying moment comes when Roux returns to Lasquenet after his boat is burned by racist locals. Forgiveness is one thing, but this is utter idiocy. What is really being witnessed is a film where human nastiness is forgiven by a shrug of the shoulders, a winsome smile, and a chocolate from Ms. Binoche.

Not only is the center of Hallström’s film foul tasting, there’s also its utter lack of finesse in the script and direction. Here’s a particularly egregious example. A woman comes into Vianne’s shop and is given a gift for her spouse that is good for reawakening passion. The woman’s completely unoriginal response, “You’ve never met my husband,” follows. A slight pause is given to make room for the programmed laugh from audience members. What comes next, as if this scene couldn’t dive any lower, is a shot of the aforementioned hubby boorishly lolling in a rocking chair. Oh, but it doesn’t end there. We have to endure the husband tasting one of the chocolate covered almonds, then pouring the whole bag in his mouth, and finally leering at his wife’s posterior as she scrubs the kitchen floor. Good grief!

Save for Depp’s come and go brogue, the actors are fine, which makes the movie even more condemnable. It’s on par with the talent wasting that occurred in Bille August’s House of the Spirits. Hallström has made good movies before (My Life as a Dog, What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, even last year’s Cider House Rules), but his taste for whimsy and sentimentality falls completely flat here. Robert Nelson Jacobs who wrote the god-awful Out to Sea with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau adapted Chocolat from Joanne Harris’ novel and should clearly not be allowed near a typewriter again.

There are certainly some people out there who will enjoy Hallström’s film and will find this review a “Bah, humbug” of the highest order. These are likely the same folks who find books like The Celestine Prophecy and Chicken Soup for the Soul profound. In the same manner that these “primers” reduce the complexities of spirituality and faith to outlandish stories and trite homilies and aphorisms, Chocolat suggests that all a person needs to liberate their soul, forget all the wrongs done to them, and become happy is a piece of candy. It’s that simplistic and that stupid. My suggestion leave the wrapper on.

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