The very first feature film by the immense director Coline Serreau, “Why not!”, comes out this Wednesday, December 7 in a restored version in 4K. The perfect opportunity to (re)discover this subversive and uninhibited gem.
In a suburban house from the 1970s, Alexa, Fernand and Louis live harmoniously, dividing up roles such as the various domestic tasks. Their singular threesome works rather well, until the day when a drifting police inspector and a bourgeois woman with a big heart get involved…
First fiction of the famous director of “Three men and a basket”, “Why not!”, Which was a real success on its release, however had some difficulties in mounting. It is easy to imagine the reasons, despite the post-68 wind of freedom which then set French society ablaze like the movie theater (“Emmanuelle”, “Les valseuses”, “The last tango in Paris”…).
However, Coline Serreau’s words undoubtedly pushed the envelope even further with this anti-conformist, anti-patriarchal ode driven by a thirst for freedom freed from the usual codes: non-gendered threesome love (or “troupe” as it were we today). This visionary and premonitory audacity is quite mind-blowing in view of this incredibly uninhibited and subversive script for the time. And above all a harbinger of mental, societal and sexual revolutions, some four decades later!
An activist filmography
On closer inspection, Coline Serreau has always been the spearhead of societal struggles by wielding with mad talent – and obvious narrative and playful power – her camera like her pen.
“Chaos”, “Three men and a basket” (Césars and 10 million admissions in 1985), “Romuald and Juliette”, “La Belle Verte” and of course “La crise” (which has become a multigenerational cult film) have enamelled the imagination of the French who felt both jostled and softened by the benevolence of this artist-citizen. An activist who was most of the time right before her time by making us wear new glasses… And “Why not!”, who celebrates her 45th birthday this month, remains the most eloquent demonstration of this.
