Dark Victory

THE GREAT AIDS movie of our time may turn out to be Patrice Chereau's Son Frère (His Brother)-not Angels in America, which Mike Nichols made into an unwieldy, impersonal botch. This masterpiece might have been expected from Chereau, who directed Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train, the epic summation of contemporary sexual difference, family and destiny. But the surprise is that Chereau's new film (about two estranged brothers who regain their closeness when one becomes ill) isn't, strictly speaking, about AIDS. Yet it brings visual eloquence and emotional revelation to the way that the AIDS epidemic affects individuals in the modern world. How Parisians Luc and Thomas (Eric Caravaca and Bruno Todoschini) contend with the realization of death evokes the same sudden awareness of mortality that has been forced upon people who thought they (or someone they know) were in the midst of life.

There's so much life in Chereau's movie-depicting Luc and Thomas' reunion, their confidences and new camaraderie in a non-linear order-that the rhythm of the brothers' moments together is highlighted. Every scene feels spontaneous, yet each one is also as trenchant as a memory. His Brother is a relay of intimate gestures-whether showing a demoralized Luc refusing an advance from his lover or Thomas eagerly touching his own lover just to prove he still can-it's deft, never lachrymose.

To say the film is haunted by the specter of AIDS is inexact. Luc, the gay brother, is healthy. It is Thomas, the straight brother, who contracts a debilitating blood disease. Yet Chereau dares not speak the disease's name for fear of making it banal like a tv movie-of-the-week. In addition to being a shrewd artistic decision, it's also a very bold political move. Chereau has made a movie that neither the squeamish nor the judgmental can justifiably ignore. His attention to universal sorrow upsets the expectation of fatality that allows people to shrug off AIDS dramas.

This magnificent conceit is part of Chereau's broadminded commitment to unorthodox lifestyles. With His Brother, Chereau makes up for the miscalculation of his 2001 film Intimacy, in which he attempted to channel his liberal view of sexual behavior into a "universal" heterosexual archetype. The male-female analogy of Intimacy felt like Chereau was trying to transcend the tag of gay filmmaker by going so boldly and explicitly into heterosexuality. Good thing he got that out of his system without trying to "transcend" AIDS as a gay issue.

His Brother appeals to a level of personal and social enlightenment that already transcends the particularizing of race, gender, class, orientation. This could be the consequence of two decades of activism and the barrier-breaking of such AIDS films as Cyril Collard's Savage Nights and Gregg Araki's The Living End, but it is also a sign of Chereau's special artistry. His vision is uniquely, soberly attuned to what defines human drama. His Brother isn't campy like Almodovar's Talk to Her-an AIDS allegory that took a safe, mocking, hetero-farce approach to human calamity. Chereau's seriousness evokes the classic death-watch film Dark Victory (1939), not as camp melodrama but claiming the spiritual righteousness that gays covertly appreciated in that Bette Davis vehicle.

This cultural advance is further illuminated by Criterion's current reissue of Merchant Ivory's 1987 Maurice. Adapting E.M. Forster's posthumously published coming-out novel, M-I meticulously toppled restrictions against gay movie content. It's more poignant now to see how gentlemanly M-I were in their brave caution. James Wilby in the title role and his lovers Hugh Grant and Rupert Graves, so young and game yet discreet, seem caught up in Forster's own reticence while the film keeps leaning forward. The DVD is most remarkable for the extra interviews wherein M-I describe the film's "happy ending," even though the ending is actually disquieting. M-I did not fully assert equal legitimacy with heterosexual life, which is Chereau's, and His Brother's, guiding principle. ^^^ Instead of arguing a valid social cause, Chereau's means of persuasion is his palpable affinity with actors. Caravaca and Todoschini resemble brothers so well-including their tall/taller physical contrasts-that they become a portraitist's study in family kinship. As both men lower their eyelids and hang their heads, their similar full jaws, dark beards and hawkish noses achieve an almost romantic aspect. Chereau often frames them together in three-quarter and one-half profiles; not the abstract geometry of Bergman's Persona, but a sculptural image of a duo in the process of turning toward each other. Caravaca's gentleness is compelling, and Todoschini complements it audaciously, showing thought within pain. There's an affecting sense that he'd like to help his younger, healthy brother cope. These images recall a line from Angels in America where one despairing character consoles another, "In the deepest part of yourself you are not sick." Foregrounding skin texture, coloring, hair, Chereau emphasizes common humanity. The film is an essay in esprit de corps.

Hospital scenes where Luc stands vigil near Thomas, watching their visiting parents and proficient nurses, have a documentary quality. But somehow the details are memoir-like, poetic. (The nurses' pre-op shaving of Thomas is unforgettable for its tact and tenderness.) Thomas' bed is next to that of a young man whose bruises mar those parts of his body not covered by an extreme tattoo, a point that further connects Thomas' plight to others (even AIDS stereotypes). But this is not medical porn; Chereau is never grisly. He's stouthearted about illness, like the doctor (Catherine Ferran) attending Thomas. Her hair is limp, yet she manages an affectionate demeanor despite the fatigue of witnessing, of knowing too much and dealing with the hopeless. Chereau's view of suffering is comparably tough and compassionate. When Luc is confronted by a young patient awaiting his next surgery, it's an unsettling moment that's also purgative. Luc's heart goes out. He takes the kid's hand, achieving a profound sense of his feelings about Thomas and his own flesh.

Chereau has admitted His Brother is "a film about bodies." Above all, it's about touching. Once-distant Luc and Thomas now spend time together suspended in sadness but bound by a history of mixed emotions. On a nude beach, in the gay section among younger, healthier bodies, they bring up old recriminations and a complex problem: familial misunderstanding that occurs out of individual longing and ambition-often a deeper division than the difference of gayness. (This rarely understood conflict was also confessed in Techine's I Don't Kiss and has antecedents in Eugene O'Neill's Beyond the Horizon.)

Touching the surface of gay experience, then going deeper, is Chereau's genius. His body consciousness leads to spiritual consciousness. It's a great coincidence that His Brother syncs with the genuine power of The Passion of the Christ through Chereau's fearlessness about the human vessel, his conviction about the soul within. When Thomas cringes after yet another diagnosis, Luc cradles his body and unsnaps the hospital gown to caress Thomas' shoulder and back. Not simply homoeroticism, it's homo-humanism. It's one of the finest scenes in modern movies, consistent with the difficult and tender things that love witnesses-and Chereau shows us. (John Cassavetes' 1984 sibling drama Love Streams and Maurice Pialat's Le Guele Ouvert are clear influences; Chereau's physicality surpasses both.)

Dark Victory repeatedly comes to mind, because Chereau similarly prevails over the story's gloom. Emboldened by Merchant-Ivory and Cyril Collard's bravery, he refuses to accept pity as the basis of audience understanding. Dark Victory wasn't simply a tearjerker; its greatness came from Bette Davis' recognition of what living was worth. "Oh Give Me Time for Weeping," Davis sang. (Chereau's use of a mournful Marianne Faithfull tune might be a little too similar.) While exploring Thomas' physical anguish, Chereau also takes his introspection to a higher level. Rethinking the nature of his life-including the non-idealized relationship with his lover Claire (Nathalie Boutefeu)-gives Thomas the same complications recognizable in his gay brother. His Brother is structured around Luc's spiritual and physical enlightenment-a gay sensibility-that is also rigorous and sensual. (That's what Angels in America lacked; you could only applaud the ceremony-and only if already inclined.) Chereau's high points include Luc imagining himself in his brother's place. Recalling the vitality he'll never forget about Thomas opens up Luc's devastating sense of helplessness. Another high point shows Thomas swimming in the ocean, his beautiful, scarred body reaching for the horizon. As rendered by cinematographer Eric Gautier, this shot is a gift, a victory over the dark.