MovieChat Forums > Dans la maison (2012) Discussion > Claude only exists in the mind of Germai...

Claude only exists in the mind of Germain, or vice versa?

posted 11 years ago by fredrikskyllback
4 replies | jump to latest

I watched the movie yesterday with my girlfriend and she interpreted the plot as the fantasy of a teacher who recently was left by his wife and lost his job (maybe because he ridiculed a pupil in class?). According to this theory Germain is a bitter teacher and failed author who dislikes himself and despises everyone else. What we see in the movie is what is going on in the mind of Germain as he tries to process the trauma of losing wife and work by making a story. Claude might represent Germain as a teenager or the son he never had? The Artole family maybe represents his own boring middle class life?

I had a different theory: Germain is a character in Claude's story. Claude is a lonely teenager who longs for a father figure. He fantasizes about his French teacher adopting him as his protege. This troubled kid is both envious and contemptuous of the Artole family and wants not only approval from them and Germain but also to control them and prove his superiority. The story of the movie is being written by Claude as we see it, very much like in "Adoptation". Pretty much nothing is real, although the characters are taken from Claude's real life.

Eitherway, lots of things suggests that Claude and Germain might be just one person, for instance the simularity of the title of Germain's book and some sentences in Claude's letters. Maybe they are each others alter egos? (Don't ask me how that would work ;))

[–] benman46 11 years ago

I'm afraid you and your girlfriend are both wrong. Both characters exist, they are not figments of each others' imagination. Everything is real to begin with, but as the film progresses reality starts to blur into fiction. If the film was as you suggest it would not make a lick of sense. Francois Ozon, in the films of his I have seen, is interested in the real not the fantastic. A glance at the synopsis will tell you what the film is really about. There are interviews with Ozon online that will give you an insight into what the film is really about.

[–] fredrikskyllback 11 years ago

I'm sorry if I gave you the impression I didn't get the plot. I understand the story, but for me it was more than the standard thriller. In the beginning we're standing on solid ground, but it quickly erodes, faster than we first suspect. Are we in the mind of Claude or Germain? Or in the reality of the film? Are we in fact the audience at a lecture on narrative, on creation, on mans unfailing thirst for a good story and the wish to tell it? I'd like to think so.

I'm not saying my theories are right, all I am interested in is to look at the movie from different angles and discuss alternative interpretations. To me, it seems like Ozon is teasing us, giving us hints and references so that we can analyze it from our own experiences. When Germain and Jeanne is at the movie theater, is he talking about the dialogue in Claude´s letters, or is he in fact reflecting us, the audience, and talking about the movie itself?

All we know is we can't trust our eyes when we see what happens in Claude´s letters. Why would we trust our eyes when it comes to the rest?

[–] PoppyTransfusion 10 years ago

The characters exist. What is uncertain is the fiction versus reality of Claude's stories. Where Germain appears in the scenes depicting events Claude is narrating that is a more creative device to shows Germain's critique.

This film wasn't a thriller.

The distance is nothing. The first step is the hardest.

[–] hannahbtcgte 8 years ago

This film wasn't a thriller.

Genres: Comedy | Drama | Mystery | Thriller