The Colors of Fire

February 1927, Paris. The funeral of the banker Marcel Péricourt is taking place. His daughter Madeleine is left the owner of a great fortune. During the funeral her son falls from a window and is paralysed. After that everyone around her moves slowly on the money: the family lawyer, the business partners and her brother. Within a few years she loses everything. Then she decides to take it back, and not in court but by the same methods. Clovis Cornillac directs and appears in the film. Léa Drucker plays Madeleine; Benoît Poelvoorde, Alice Isaaz and Fanny Ardant are in the cast. The source is Pierre Lemaitre's novel, the second book of his series about the same family. The narrative is counted as the continuation of an earlier film but is built so that it can be watched on its own. It is set in the years between the wars and the rising political climate enters the narrative in the background. Its strongest side is the art direction; the Paris of the period and its business circles are built in detail. The revenge plan the narrative builds is elaborate and the film opens it step by step, a structure close to the classical examples of the genre. Its limit is length; the number of people grows in the second half and some strands are left unresolved. Who it is for: viewers who like period revenge stories and French productions. Who it is not for: there are many characters, the pace is uneven, and the narrative carries the weight of the novel.