César winner Arnaud Desplechin's MY GOLDEN DAYS: Growing up absurd, French style

"Golden"? How ironic, almost anti-nostalgic, considering that the days shown here -- the whole life, really -- are pretty damned fraught. The films of Arnaud Desplechin, who just recently won a César award as Best Director for this movie, just keep getting better. On-the-job training is certainly paying off for this guy, who in recent years has given us the likes of A Christmas Tale and Jimmy P.  With MY GOLDEN DAYS (Trois souvenirs de ma jeunesse), opening today in New York and Los Angeles, Desplechin has created in some ways his best film yet, the one that is likely to be the most appreciated by American mainstream/arthouse audiences.

M. Desplechin, pictured at left, begins with his hero as an adult (played by the always terrific Mathieu Amalric, below), who has a little passport trouble, as is often the case in these post 9-11 times, and while speaking with the authorities (in the person of the great André Dussollier), relives some of those golden days for our delectation. And while the movie may be a kind of memory piece, the style in which Deplechin has chosen to film it is every bit his own.

The young actor selected to portray the adolescent and young adult version of Amalric -- newcomer Quentin Dolmaire, below -- is so exquisitely beautiful (he possess one of those faces on which the camera simply dotes: think the young Alain Delon) that you may have trouble imagining that he could turn into the older Amalric. But his beauty is such that I doubt you'd want to replace him. Dolmaire proves up to the role, acting-wise, as well. He brings a quietly thoughtful, almost deliberately philosophically transgressive presence to these proceedings which helps carry the film along.

Divided into not particularly necessary "episodes" -- Childhood, Russia, Esther, Epilog -- the movie tracks our hero, Paul Dédalus, and his longtime, long-germinating affair with another oddball, but more obviously transgressive character, Esther (played by first-timer, Lou Roy-Lecollinet, below). How these two meet, spar and slowly join forces makes for quite an original look at "first love."

The first half of the film moves pretty much like a house afire, what with a school trip to Russia, during which Paul and a friend take a sidetrip into helping some Russian Jews illegally emigrate to Israel. Later our hero gets a nasty beat-down (below) by a jealous would-be boyfriend. (Desplechin also offers up some of the kind of split-screen moviemaking that will take us oldsters back to the 1960s.)

The movie. being both French and well-done, is philosophical without even trying, and when at last the lovemaking begins, it is gentle and exploratory, which seems exactly right, given Paul's history and situation at this point in those "golden days." Our boy will confront death, loss and, most important, living -- and at one point along the way, you'll realize with shock that, OMG, for his mate he has chosen someone far too like his mother. Oh, right: We all do that....

The film also includes a lovely, direct and no-nonsense fantasy sequence that further shows off Desplechin's growing skills, and if the movie's pace lessens noticeably during its second half and the on-again/off-again romance grows just a tad tiresome, things pick up toward the end. (That's the very fine actor, Olivier Rabourdin -- of Eastern Boys -- above, left, as Paul's dad, with Lily Taieb, as his sister, Delphine.)

The finale brings us back to Amalric, and it may briefly put you in mind of Paolo Sorrentino's recent Youth, in that it involves young men's sexual jealousy still potent in later years and even includes a bit of operatic song. Not to worry: It will also be quite clear how very different these French are from those Italians.

Distributed by Magnolia Pictures and running 124 minutes, My Golden Days opens today at The Landmark in West Los Angeles and in New York City at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the IFC Center. Click here to see all currently scheduled playdates, with dates, cities and theaters shown.

Worthwhile streaming: Arnaud Desplechin's JIMMY P. tackles psychology and healing

Something different (as well as his second film in the English language) from French filmmaker Arnaud Desplechin is his (along with co-writers Kent Jones and Julie Peyr) adaptation of ethnologist/ psychoanalyst Georges Devereux's book, Reality and Dream: Psychotherapy of a Plains Indian. The subtitle of the book is also the subtitle of this movie -- JIMMY P. -- and I'm wondering if it perhaps turned audiences off a bit, making them imagine they'd be getting something too dry and academic. (Even TrustMovies, as much as he'd wanted to see the film, managed to wait a month or three after it became available on Netflix streaming before he dived in.) He should not have worried, and neither should you. This is one remarkable, and remarkably vital and enjoyable movie.

Two hours long and without a boring moment, Desplechin, shown at left, gets just about everything right -- from the wonderful 1950s feel (including sets, costumes, cars and attitudes) to the unshowy but spectacularly good performances from the entire cast, especially his two lead actors, Benicio Del Toro and Mathieu Amalric. And while the story is indeed all about the psychotherapy of a Plains Indian, though it is intelligent and real as it shows us the act of therapy from doctor to patient, with emphasis on the importance of dreams, it is not in the least dry or academic. "You are there," as the saying goes, right in the dense and emotional middle of this act of healing.

Yet the movie is nothing like one prolonged therapy-fest. Instead, Desplechin weaves Jimmy P.'s history of love and wartime and reservation life into the whole, and Del Toro uses all his skills to bring to life (and not a little sorrow) this grand character descended from an Indian chief. (That's Misty Upham with Del Toro in the photo above.)

The filmmaker also gives the therapist his due, as we learn of Devereux's own past -- and more. When the major love of his life (very well played by Gina McKee, above, right) -- married to a friend of his, it would seem -- comes to the Midwest for a visit, we spend a good deal of time with the pair.

In the supporting cast are a number of fine actors -- from Larry Pine (above, right, as Karl Menninger) to A Martinez (as another therapy patient) -- mostly playing doctors or Indians. Because there are no false steps (that I could see, at least), this is a movie you can easily relax into, enjoy and learn from.

In fact, it's among the most edifying films of the past several years. It makes us grateful for the visionaries of psychology and therapy, as well providing us with a bracing reminder of our own native Americans. Without ever once bringing up overtly the plight of our Indians, the movie allows us to see in sustained fashion their strength and endurance and what we have still to learn and gain from them -- as well as what we must give them back to make them whole again.

Jimmy P. can be streamed now via Netflix (and elsewhere, I suspect). It's a film that intelligent audiences, as well as movie buffs, will want to see.