La Belle Noiseuse – Divertimento *** (1993, Michel Piccoli, Jane Birkin, Emmanuelle Béart) – Classic Movie Review 7633

Jacques Rivette’s La Belle Noiseuse – Divertimento is a 126-minute cut-down recycling of the long, 240-minute version of his 1991 masterwork La Belle Noiseuse, which has been altered in key scenes (especially the epilogue) and has omissions that modify the characters (for example now the lovely young artist’s model called Marianne, played by Emmanuelle Béart, has no calling to be a writer). It has less nudity, brighter lighting, alternative takes and different editing.

Oddly, the ellipses and pacing accelerations merely add conventionality to the drama and longueurs to the scenes, making it paradoxically seem too long for the material at hand, material that now seems too thin for a major movie.

It is enterprising to get two bites of the cherry, but La Belle Noiseuse – Divertimento is a far less satisfactory version of the film. Divertimento is pleasant minor divertissement, that is all, not managing to say anything very important – or at least not saying it very startlingly – about art or the characters.

The paintings by the artist Edouard Frenhofer (Michel Piccoli), by the way, are grotesquely horrid. Jane Birkin plays the painter’s wife Liz and David Bursztein plays Marianne’s young artist boyfriend Nicolas.

It was prepared for showing on TV, but then released theatrically in 1993.

Also in the cast are Marianne Denicourt, Gilles Arbona, Marie Belluc, Marie-Claude Roger, Leïla Remili and Bernard Dufour.

La Belle Noiseuse is directed by Jacques Rivette, runs 126 minutes, is made by Pierre Grise Productions, FR 3 Films Production, George Reinhart Productions, Canal Plus and Sofica, is written by Jacques Rivette, Pascal Bonitzer and Christine Laurent, is shot in Eastmancolor by William Lubtchansky, and is produced by Pierre Grise, George Reinhart and Martine Marignac, with music by Igor Stravinsky.

It was shot at Assas, Hérault, France.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7633

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