Camille Japy goes from the role of actress to that of director with this first feature film, Under the carpet. On the occasion of its release in physical format, let's go back a while on this French comedy that has a dead body in the closet...
Brain death?
Odile (Ariane Ascaride recently found in voice participation in Forbidden by dogs and Italians) intends to bring together his children and grandchildren to celebrate his birthday. As the preparations are in full swing, her husband suddenly dies of a heart attack. Terrassed, she will eventually pull her husband's corpse under the bed and welcome her children (Berenice Bejo and Thomas Scimeca) as if nothing were... If the masquerade lasts for a while, the family's cracks will soon resurface.
Let's talk frankly. Under the carpet It's a bad start. The exhibition drags in its wake a gallery of unbearable and dazzling characters, almost all more annoying than each other. Cherry on the cake, a mid-fig mid-raisin interpretation (see squarely semi-fig, mid-fig) that is not necessarily going to fix during the feature film. Between dramatic thrusts overplayed or on feigned excitement, the gallery of actors pushes the potashes to the fullest (noting the performances of Ariane Ascaride and Marilou Aussilloux, the two who get out the best) and god knows if it does not benefit Under the carpet.
Dead and buried?
However, in overprinting appears little by little a more serious vein, where comedy sometimes heavying (the unbearable role of beauf of Stéphane Brel In particular) leaves room for a rare and sometimes interesting discourse on the relationship we can have with death. Better, some paintings appear where the lights up until then are quite worthy of a telefilm that has a certain stamp: night scenes, a whole sequence between the children and their deceased grandfather, scenes of love... Better, this mid-film sometimes comes from the emotional puffs that we didn't see coming, always carried by the grandmother's character.
Unfortunately, in the wake of a dramatic turn (after a funeral scene almost pleasant by its burlesque side), a last explosion of pathos imposed by the dictate of a scripting order here totipotent manages to make forget all that we raised positive in the preceding paragraph: ahead of violins, actors in freewheels, back to a pure narrative like cigarette paper... Anyway, Under the carpet negotiates this final turn very badly and it is a great pity because will remain in the mouth of the spectator an unalterable bitter taste.
In short, Under the carpet Camille Japy could have become a memorable French drama, thanks in particular to his bold tone breaks and a speech not so often developed in cinema. Unfortunately, a tenacious bicephaly will repeatedly return the film to its script reefs, far too often in any case not to crack its hull. But Under the carpet still raises the level of French comedy mainstream and is worth a look at for several of its internal segments that surprise the rest of the film.
To find already in physical format with as bonus Girls, a short film by Camille Japy (2017, 16 min).
Data sheet
DVD Zone B (France)
Publisher: Blaq Out
Duration: 93 min
Release date: 05 December 2023
Video format : 576p/25 - 1.85
Soundtrack : French Dolby Digital 5.1 (and 2.0)
Subtitles : French and English
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