The toast: a French comedy that never stops starting

just started The toastdirector Laurent Tirard attracts the viewer’s attention a singularity in the titles. Here there are no writings on the screen, as is customary in the cinema, but Adrien, the protagonist of the film, tells the names of each member of the cast and the technical staff in charge of the film in front of a red curtain.

This detail will immediately take shape and content during the almost 90 minutes of a comedy centered entirely on its thirty-year-old protagonist.

Adrien is devastated because, over a month ago, Sonia left him with no explanation other than “I need a break”.

There begins the path of the protagonist who seeks some explanation that closes him in his head, as if he were the character of John Cusack in High fedelity with the dose of paranoia in which Jim Carrey played Eternal light of the pure mind.

tyrant openly resumes the long monologues in front of the camera with the speculations of the protagonist of the first film and, from the second, the playful visual cues for the passages between some scenes.

Almost like in the theater

The toast takes place, almost in real time and too close to the theater field, during a customary dinner in Adrien’s family with his parents, his sister and his brother-in-law, after making the decision to text your ex.

The protagonist’s anxiety in waiting for an answer from Sonia is heightened by boredom caused by family reunification, which debates the effectiveness of underfloor heating with the usual menu. Tirard effectively describes the typical problem when it comes to opening up and sharing intimate feelings with the people closest to you.

Director places the viewer at the head of the tableright in front of Adrien, so that the protagonist, in addition to marveling every few minutes looking directly at the camera, can convey a little empathy.

A feeling that is quickly lost when Adrien becomes self-centered to the point of irritation because a conversation about terminally ill relatives prevents him from looking at the phone during dinner without sounding rude.

The last straw for the protagonist comes immediately, when his brother-in-law asks him to take charge of the toast of the upcoming marriage with his sister. Adrien shows his selfishness trying every possible speech in his mind, self-centered, never considering the wedding guests beyond their impact on the emotions of this type of late adolescence.

Adrien’s solipsism becomes scandalous as he goes through every emotion in his long duel, even as Benjamin Lavernhe manages to bring a modicum of sympathy to his character.

Humor is the only respite from the overwhelming inner process of the protagonist and the crude jokes, on a hand-made phallic coat rack or on the desires hiding in the bark of a tree, work to decompress that youthful anguish that this thirty-year-old immediately turns into panic, imagining that his ex is singing to him in the ear “I won’t write to you anymore, you are a real pig”.

Like it’s a growing up movie focusing on puberty, The toast he accompanies Adrien on a path of maturation and acceptance until he reaches that definitive discourse, in which he shows that an answer was enough for him and that now it didn’t matter to have Sonia back.

File

The toast (The speeches)

Qualification: Regular

Comedy. France, 2020, 87 ‘. Of: Laurent Tirard. With: Benjamin Lavernhe, Sara Giraudeau, Julia Piaton Rooms: Multiplex, Belgrano Showcase, Cinemark Palermo

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