The French as a people are renowned (or perhaps notorious) for their good taste. With regards to food and wine, this reputation is well-deserved but this good taste doesn’t always follow through into the realm of the comedy film, where broad sitcom-esque scenarios and slapstick rule. Thank goodness then for Francois Ozon, who has produced another confident and sophisticated yet wickedly funny piece of entertainment with In the House.
Germain (Fabrice Luchini) is a literature teacher who is feeling decidedly uninspired by his pupils. When he sets an exercise to write about their weekends, one piece by a pupil named Claude (Ernst Umhauer) stands out above the rest. In it, Claude describes how he has become fascinated by the home life of a fellow pupil and how he longs to enter this household and insinuate himself into the family. Initially troubled by the frank nature of the essay, Germain and his gallery owner wife (Kristin Scott-Thomas) quickly become hooked by the story. As Claude escalates his campaign, Germain loses track of his ethics and becomes complicit in the sinister narrative.
A film about class and power, voyeurism and storytelling, In the House is a rich, beguiling melange of ideas that will speak to different audience members differently. Ozon skilfully plays around with contrasting themes, producing a film that is not only full to the brim with ideas but also genuinely funny. Cinematic in-jokes referencing Pasolini rub shoulders with broader satire at the expense of modern art, bourgeois masculinity and suburban family life.
The cast are more than up to the task of following the twists and turns of the narrative. Luchini excels as Germain; his deterioration from well-respected teacher to morally corrupt milquetoast is wonderfully described. Umhauer meanwhile puts in a genuinely disquieting performance – the dark heart balancing out the comedic elements. A creature of cunning, deliberate cruelty, his interaction with the Artole family has all the hallmarks of a dispassionate lab worker experimenting on rats. Thomas is wonderful as always and Emmanuelle Seigner is also impressive as the bored suburban mother, sleepwalking through her life.
With In the House, Ozon has produced another slice of suburban satire that is thought-provoking and damn clever while also being a jolly good time.