Masks (1987)

Movie
German title	Masks
Original title	Masques
Country of production	France
original language	French
Publishing year	1987
length	100 minutes
Age rating	FSK 12
Rod
Director	Claude Chabrol
script	Odile Barski Claude Chabrol
production	Marin Karmitz
music	Matthieu Chabrol
camera	Jean Rabier
cut	Monique Fardoulis
occupation
Philippe Noiret : Christian Legagneur Robin Renucci : Roland Wolf Bernadette Lafont : Patricia Marquet Monique Chaumette : Colette Anne Brochet : Catherine Roger Dumas : Manu Pierre-François Dumeniaud : Max Pierre Nougaro : Gustave Renée Dennsy : Émilie Yvonne Decade : Antoinette Blanche Ariel : rosette René Marjac : Maurice

Masks is a 1987 French feature film directed by Claude Chabrol .

action

The jovial and chatty Christian Legagneur is the presenter of the TV show "Glück für alle", which is particularly popular with seniors who dance and sing and are flattered by Legagneur. Now the young journalist Roland Wolf is supposed to write his biography. Legagneur invites the young man to accompany him to his country estate. He lives aristocratically in a remote villa with many domestic workers. After intensive research, Wolf finds out that each of the servants leads a double life.

But Wolf also leads a double life and is really called Chevalier; he is looking for his sister Madeleine, who last lived in the Legagneur house and has since disappeared. Legagneur's godchild, young Catherine, lives in this house and is kept dependent on her godparent. When Roland secretly opens a box at night, he learns that Legagneur has robbed his goddaughter of her inheritance and deliberately puts her in a sickly state because he fears that the dizziness will be exposed when she comes of age. When Catherine falls in love with Roland and is getting better and better, Lagagneur and his helpers get restless. Finally, Roland manages to open Catherine's eyes. When she tries to escape, Legagneur's servants Max and Colette drug her and take her away. Max drives her to a Legagneur-owned junkyard, where Catherine is put in the trunk of an old Cadillac that is due to be scrapped the next morning.

At the last moment, Roland manages to save Catherine. When Legagneur, unsuspecting, produces his next show, the two burst in. When his “mask fell”, Legagneur complains about the whole mendacity of his old age broadcast. Finally the police arrive to arrest him; he closes the film with: "There is only one thing left for me to say: lick my ass!"

Reviews

"A comedic staging of criminalistic cultural and moral criticism, entertaining and worth discussing."

- Lexicon of international film

Awards

• International Film Festival Berlin 1987 : Nomination for a Golden Bear as best film
• César 1988: Nomination for Bernadette Lafont as best supporting actress and for Anne Brochet as best young actress

Web links

• Masks in theInternet Movie Database(English)
• Masks in the online film database
• Masks atrotten tomatoes(English)
• Criticism by Thomas Groh in the Filmzentrale

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Release certificate for masks . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , February 2008 (PDF; test number: 58 314 DVD).
2. ↑ masks. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .