SYNONYMS, the third feature of Israeli filmmaker Nadav Lapid, which wins him Berlin's highest honor, has a simple fish-out-of-water premise, Yoav (Mercier), a former Israeli soldier winds up in Paris on his own-some to begin a new lease on life.
Plumb on the very first night, he passes out in the cold and empty apartment, after his belongings are stolen when he is taking a shower, rescued by the neighbors Émile (Dolmaire), a well-off young man inspiring to be a man of letters, and his oboe-playing girlfriend Caroline (Chevillotte), the trio strikes up an amicable if blunt bond, Yoav receives monetary aid from Émile, in return, he imparts him his own life story in Israel as inspirations for the latter's literature creation, and his belated carnal knowledge with Caroline is simply icing on the cake which improbably leads to a marriage proposal and an obscure fallout.
Played by Mercier, a hunky debutant actor, Yoav is stripped down to the buff only minutes into the film, dispossessed, vulnerable and helpless, this immigrant's dire situation can only be too facilely construed as a metaphor of the underside of Europe's frame of mind towards the hot button, and what follows is a series of inherent happenings around him, often presented in rash, disjointed sequences.
Like the limit-pushing ranting of one's Jewish identity in the public transport, or a rough-and-tumble between two suited men as some form of initiation to fight Neo-Nazi delinquents, with Yoav sidelined as a nonplussed onlooker; or a commotion caused by Yoav in the Israeli embassy shy of any context, not to mention Yoav's traumatic experience as a naked model under the instruction of Raphaël (Paou). The problem is, they are more apposite as snippets of performing arts burst with political or erotic agendas, concatenated haphazardly like this, punctuated by the over-repeated motif of reading out loud similar words selected from the dictionary, SYNONYMS' braggadocio doesn't generate a satisfactory viewing,what also beggars belief is the misalignment of Yoav's alleged level as a French-speaking beginner and his fluent pontification in service of Lapid's whims.
With its shady, guerrilla style camera movement in the public space that induces mild disorientation, SYNONYMS nails it color to the mast of Yoav's radical severance of his fatherland by refusing speaking Hebrew (a pledge he breaks far too easily when cowed by Raphaël into submission) , but what is the rationale? The skimpy flashback in Israel never mounts to anything intelligible to empathize, all the more, Lapid's insistent cageyness is frustrating, and his manipulation of Mercier's rawness and nudity touches on exploitative, culminated with the poor guy thrusting himself against a stoutly closed door, again and again, that looks painful and his motivation is unwarranted. While conforming to Berlin's time-honored propensity of awarding overtly political works, Lapid's triumph ultimately feels unearned, his previous film,THE KINDERGARTEN TEACHER (2014) is a more well-rounded construction in almost all the aspects.
referential entries: Nadav Lapid's THE KINDERGARTEN TEACHER (2014, 7.3/10); Bernardo Bertolucci's THE DREAMERS (2003, 8.3/10).
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