La Moustache

Infobox Film
name = La Moustache

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image_size =
caption = The official theatrical poster from The Cinema Guild
director = Emmanuel Carrère
producer = Anne-Dominique Toussaint
writer = Jérôme Beaujour (writer)
Emmanuel Carrère (screenplay)
narrator =
starring = Vincent Lindon
music = Philip Glass
cinematography = Patrick Blossier
editing = Camille Cotte
distributor = Pathé
released = 2005
runtime = 87 min
country = France
language = French / English / Cantonese
budget =
gross =
preceded_by =
followed_by =
website = http://www.cinemaguild.com/lamoustache
amg_id =
imdb_id = 0428856

"La Moustache" (in English, "The Moustache") is a French film from 2005, directed by Emmanuel Carrère and starring Vincent Lindon, and adapted from Carrère's own novel. The film was awarded the "Label Europa Cinemas" prize at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival and is currently distributed theatrically in the United States by the Cinema Guild with a DVD release handled by Koch-Lorber Films.

Plot

"La Moustache" opens with Marc Thiriez, a middle aged Parisian, asking his wife if he should shave off the moustache he has sported for most of his adult life. His wife, Agnès, wryly comments that she wouldn't recognize him without it, yet as she leaves, Marc shaves the moustache off. Upon her return, Marc asks his wife if she notices anything. She does not respond. Later that evening, as the two visit their best friends Serge and Nadia, they too do not notice that Marc has shaven his trademark moustache. Frustrated, Marc fights with Agnès in the car as they return home. As they lie in bed that night, another fight over the moustache ensues as Agnès informs Marc that he's never had a moustache and that she fears for his sanity.

Marc eventually finds a photo album of pictures from their holiday in Bali, all of which show him sporting his moustache. When he confronts Agnès with these pictures, she ignores him and changes the subject, leaving him even more confused than before. She then suggests that Marc see a psychiatrist whom her friend François knew. Marc tries to make the best of his situation, yet is growing more paranoid and more confused as the days pass when even his co-workers don't acknowledge that he has shaven his moustache.

A few days later, as Marc is getting his photograph taken for his work, he asks a woman who is also getting her photograph taken if she notices a difference between the photograph that was just taken and his photograph which appears on his I.D. card. She says the moustache is different, and Marc asks her several times if she is sure he has a moustache in the photograph. She confirms this, which leaves Marc even more baffled than he was before. Confused, he returns home early from work.

Marc checks his answering machine upon returning home to find a message from his father. In addition, he talks for a few minutes to Agnès' friend Bruno before becoming noticeably more upset over the situation. Whilst in the kitchen, he tells Agnès to call his parents and tell them that he won't be able to come to their house for dinner tonight. Agnès calls Marc's mother, but then informs Marc that his father is dead and has been so for a year. Confused, Marc speaks of their best friends Serge and Nadia, to which Agnès replies that she doesn't know who they are and that Marc must be delusional. Very upset and slowly losing his grip on sanity, Marc retires to his bedroom, and Agnès gives him a sleeping pill.

After a brief sleep, Marc awakes and overhears Agnès and Bruno detailing their plan to have Marc committed to a psychiatric hospital. Marc quickly dresses himself and flees the house. In a taxi, he attempts to find his mother, yet due to his condition and the heavy rain, he fails to make contact with her and instead calls Agnès. He informs Agnès that he is at his mother's and asks her to pick him up, but in reality he is lying in wait in the taxi outside of his and Agnès' house. When Agnès and Bruno leave to pick Marc up, he rushes inside, grabs his passport and leaves. In a moment of panic, he flees to Hong Kong, the first available flight out of Paris.

Marc journeys through Hong Kong, traveling back and forth on the ferry all day. After the ferry stops for the night, he pays local sailors to take him with them on their boat. They agree, and Marc arrives at an unspecified village within China. Marc stays at a hotel there for a period of time, becoming known with the locals, and regrows his signature moustache.

In the final scene, Marc arrives back at the hotel to find Agnès awaiting him. In this moment, it appears as though she has been with him the entire time. In an ambiguous ending, Agnès suggests that Marc shave his moustache so she can see him without it at least once. He does so, and Agnès comments upon how good he looks without it. The film then ends. Whether this final scene was meant to be what really happened or was just an idealised dream of what Marc wished would have happened is unspecified.

Themes

"La Moustache" captures an element of suspense, though the actions and plot are ambiguous. Many critics have said that the film's events are not literal, but metaphorical and are symbolic of Marc's loss of identity (or of a possible mid-life crisis).

Cast

* Vincent Lindon - Marc Thiriez
* Emmanuelle Devos - Agnès Thiriez
* Mathieu Amalric - Serge Schaeffer
* Hippolyte Girardot - Bruno
* Cylia Malki - Samira
* Macha Polikarpova - Nadia Schaeffer
* Fantine Camus - Lara Schaeffer
* Frédéric Imberty - Café manager
* Brigitte Bémol - Policewoman

External links

*imdb title|0428856|La Moustache
* [http://movies.nytimes.com/2006/05/24/movies/24mous.html] New York Times Review
* [http://www.cinemaguild.com/lamoustache Official website] (in English)