CHOICES // A FILM REVIEW OF "HAPPENING (L'ÉVÉNEMENT)"
Audrey Diwan's powerful and unforgettable HAPPENING (L'ÊVÊNEMENT), based on the novel by Annie Ernaux, is a film that everyone needs to see. It's a film that everyone needs to see today, especially in America. The American release is hauntingly perfect, as we watch the real world speak of the possible overturning of "Roe Vs. Wade" from our own Supreme Court. Both then and now, no one has ever fully trusted a woman to own the right to do what she deems fit with her own body. How we, as a society, feels it has the right to choose for a woman is stomach churning, and it has been forever.
Set in the early 1960's, this French drama stars Anamaria Vartolomei as Anne, a student at the top of her class. She's close with her family and has close friends and seemingly a perfect life. Everything seems to be falling into place for her future, which has her studies as the main priority. One day, however, everything changes. First thinking that she's simply sick, she quickly realizes that she's pregnant. If she has a child she'll have to forget all of her hard earned and hard fought for plans. If she has an abortion, she may end up in prison. She goes to a doctor for help and he promptly turns her away, unwilling to even consider it. Another doctor reluctantly agrees to help, but prescribes her a medication that unbeknownst to her makes her embryo stronger (if you feel a real rage upon this discovery, you're not alone). When turning to her friends, they either push her away or suggest that they have sex, since she's already pregnant. It's a disgusting world out there, and it's no wonder Anne feels she has nowhere to turn to and begins to turn to desperate measures.
HAPPENING is a gut-wrenching, hard to watch modern masterpiece. The timing of this release, oddly falling upon the leaked documents showcasing how the US Supreme Court is beginning the process to repeal Roe V. Wade, is uncanny and horrifying. How have we come so far and learned so little? Anamaria Vartolomei is perfect here, in a stunningly powerful performance that shakes you to the core. Anne is not ready to have a child, but the world around her seems to think they know better and would rather her life be decided by them than by her. The controlling nature of the world hasn't changed in the 60-some years since her story takes place. There are still so many people hiding behind their fears, their religions, their ignorance, unwilling to listen and hear what someone pregnant wants to do with their body and their future. If this feels like an "important movie," it's because it is. If it feels like required viewing, it's because it is. If you feel like you don't want to sit through a heartbreaking story like this, imagine the real life women who for decades have had to sit aside while those around them didn't want to hear their heartbreaking story. See this film. Let it wash over you. And start to demand change around you, because we can't continue to live in a world like this. We need to do better.
GRADE: A
WRITTEN BY Marcia Romano, Audrey Diwan BASED ON THE NOVEL BY Annie Ernaux DIRECTED BY Audrey Diwan STARRING Anamaria Vartolomei, Kacey Mottet Klein, Luàna Bajrami, Louise Orry-Diquéro, Louise Chevillotte, Pio Marmaï. NOW PLAYING IN SELECT CINEMAS IN NEW YORK AND LOS ANGELES. OPENS NATIONWIDE MAY 13th. FOR MORE INFO: HAPPENING