On Monday evening, France 2 is broadcasting Emma Bovary, a feature adaptation of a novel by Gustave Flaubert, with Camille Maitre and Thierry Godard, looking back at the famous author’s trial.
what is he talking about ?
1857- Court. Prosecution and defense are ready to confront each other. In the middle, Flaubert. This is his trial. Madame Bovary was found guilty of insulting public and religious morals. The pleading begins and the novel comes back to life.
Emma’s story unfolds before our eyes. The trial brings us back to reality through the intervening periods and revitalizes the debate about the status of women at the time. What is the ruling Flaubert? What is the sentence for them, for each Emma?
Monday, November 13, 9:05 pm France 2nd time.
with whom?
To embody the iconic Emma Bovary, France 2 called up Camille Metier who landed her first role here, providing the answer to Thierry Godard for the occasion. The actor best known for playing Jello in Engrenages or Raymond Schwartz in A French Village lends his features here to Charles.
Grégory Fitoussi and Julien de Saint Jean respectively play Rodolphe and Léon, Emma’s lovers. Gustave Flaubert is translated by Alexandre Blazy (Group V). Alexandre Brasseur, Laurent Stocker, Dominique Peñon and Laurent Pateau completed distribution.
Behind the camera we can find Didier Bevel, a director who has worked exclusively on M’abandonne pas and the second season of Infidèle. The script was signed by Natalie Carter and Yves Castro who adapted Gustave Flaubert’s novel.
Worth a look?
Madame Bovary is one of the most important works of French literature. Gustave Flaubert tells the story of Emma Bovary, the young wife of a provincial doctor, who has an adulterous relationship and lives beyond her means in an attempt to outwit boredom and forget the poor quality of his provincial life.
Once published in 1857, the novel was attacked by the prosecutors of the Second Empire, who considered it immoral and obscene, which would cost Flaubert a trial for insulting public and religious morals and good morals.
If the novel has been adapted more than once for television and cinema, the most memorable is Claude Chabrol’s 1991 edition, screenwriters Natalie Carter and Yves Castro offer us a committed re-reading of the work. The trial of Gustave Flaubert.
For 90 minutes, the director makes permanent trips back and forth between pleading and the adventures of Emma Bovary, played by Camille Metier. Through the author’s lawyer’s speech, and the interventions of the writer himself, the message he wanted to convey through writing the novel is highlighted.
Emma is a woman who dreams of freedom, but this is hindered by the dictates of society at that time: she exists only as a woman and a mother, and her sexuality and desires do not count. If the novel goes back to the middle of the nineteenth century, the issues addressed, particularly regarding the condition of women, remain as substantive as ever.
Even if Didier Bevel’s novel sometimes loses us a bit in his narration, Emma Bovary offers a modern look at this classic, by providing us with a new reading publication.