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Boston Globe
17-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
‘The President's Wife': Causing trouble with Catherine Deneuve
Advertisement Bernadette Chirac also writes a memoir that gets her in trouble with her daughter, Laurence (Maud Wyler), but I'm getting ahead of the story here. 'The President's Wife' does two things differently than most biopics. Rather than showing us photos of the real Bernadette and Jacques Chirac at the end of the film, it frontloads them in the opening credits. Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Catherine Deneuve as Bernadette Chirac in 'The President's Wife.' (Courtesy of Cohen Media Group) Courtesy of Cohen Media Group And instead of beginning with the familiar 'based on a true story' credit, Domnach gifts us with an onscreen choir who tells us immediately that we should not accept everything we see as truth. The choir shows up several more times, acting as a musical Greek chorus of sorts when they're not singing the 'Hallelujah' chorus or 'Habanera' from Bizet's opera, ' You don't need to know French history to enjoy 'The President's Wife,' but it would come in handy. Chirac was President of France from 1995 to 2007. The film begins in May 1995 just before Chirac wins the election. Bernadette is seen confessing to a priest that her intuition predicts her husband's victory. That intuition will become a major plot device, proving more accurate than President Chirac's entire cabinet of political advisors. Advertisement After helping her husband win the election, Bernadette believes that she will have a prominent position in the Elysée Palace as a reward. However, her verbal candor is seen as a detriment rather than an asset to her new position. Catherine Deneuve (seated) as Bernadette Chirac, Denis Podalydes as Bernard Niquet, and Sara Giraudeau as Claude Chirac in 'The President's Wife.' (Courtesy of Cohen Media Group) Courtesy of Cohen Media Group 'You're First Lady now, you can't always think out loud,' her daughter, Claude (Sara Giraudeau), tells her after Bernadette is too brutally honest with the media about a Cabinet member's personality. Claude has been her father's most trusted advisor for a long time; she favors protecting his image over dealing with familial ties and conflicts. Jacques would rather his wife be a silent ally while doing the charity appearances that are part of the First Lady's job. He has so little respect for her that she's not allowed to stand on the balcony with him in celebration of his win. Plus, he cheats on her in a very public scandal. Bernadette soon grows tired of the disrespect she's endured. Using the late Princess Diana as a model, she reinvents herself as a popular woman of the people. She collects money for children and even opens a hospital for teenagers who suffer from anorexia, the same disorder that affected her other daughter, Laurence. When Bernadette reveals that detail in her memoir after promising she would not, it drives a rift between mother and daughter. Advertisement Denis Podalydes as Bernard Niquet in 'The President's Wife.' (Courtesy of Cohen Media Group) Courtesy of Cohen Media Group That memoir is just one of the successful plans Bernadette hatches with Bernard (Denis Podalydès), the communications advisor Claude hired to teach her mother how to speak to the press. Though antagonistic at first, Bernard becomes a resourceful partner in crime. Watching Podalydès and Deneuve trade knowing glances as their plans succeed is a highlight. Her scenes with Laurent Stocker, who plays Chirac's successor, Nicolas Sarkozy, are also quite entertaining. Now in her seventh decade of starring in movies, Deneuve continues to glow onscreen. There's such beautiful mischief in her eyes, and she's at her most delectably dangerous when she's not saying anything at all. These services are employed in a fun comedy that bends the truth until it nearly breaks. In that regard, 'The President's Wife' follows the advice of Deneuve's character in 'The Truth': 'I never tell the naked truth. It's not interesting.' ★★★ THE PRESIDENT'S WIFE. Written and directed by Léa Domnach. Starring Catherine Deneuve, Michel Vuillermoz, Sara Giraudeau, Denis Podalydès, Maud Wyler, Laurent Stocker. At Landmark Kendall Square. 93 min. Unrated. Odie Henderson is the Boston Globe's film critic.
New York Times
17-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
‘The President's Wife' Review: Would Madame Get Your Vote?
From 1995 to 2007, the conservative (if politically capricious) Jacques Chirac was the president of France. But, 'The President's Wife' isn't all that interested in Chirac, played as a clueless yet charismatic charlatan by Michel Vuillermoz. The first lady, Bernadette Chirac, gets the spotlight, with the French film icon Catherine Deneuve bringing glamour and droll gusto to the part. Spanning the years of Chirac's presidency, this low-key comedy by Léa Domenach tracks the evolution of Bernadette's public image from scorned spouse in kitschy-colored skirt suits to beloved girl-boss in modern Chanel threads. A Greek chorus of church singers and a disclaimer in the opening title cards tell us that this quasi-biopic is highly fictionalized. No, Bernadette didn't secretly meet with rival politicians in confessional booths or frequent nightclubs with pop stars to rally fund-raising for her children's hospital charity. The film takes creative leaps in scenes like these as part of its puckish approach to mythmaking. Though other seemingly absurd moments are ripped straight from the TV news archives, such as her visit with Hillary Clinton to a primary school in central France (Deneuve is transposed onto footage of that real-life encounter with the help of green-screen tech). Belittled by rivals and family members alike — including her daughter Claude (Sara Giraudeau), who is one of her father's advisers — Bernadette teams up with her chief of staff, Bernard Niquet (Denis Podalydès), to revamp her political career. The duo's scheming and easy rapport make up much of the film's brisk humor, which at times can be a bit too culturally specific to resonate fully with non-French viewers. And while Deneuve brings a wonderful blend of neuroses and feigned indifference to her character, the film's pop-feminist through line dulls the comedy, creating a more conventionally celebratory portrait.
