Review: Le Deuxième Acte / The Second Act – “Weird, unusual, funny and very meta.”

Directed by Quentin Dupieux
Starring Léa Seydoux, Vincent Lindon, Louis Garrel, Raphaël Quenard, Manuel Guillot

Having opened the 77th Cannes Film Festival before appearing in the French box office, Quentin Dupieux’s latest work now comes to streaming in the UK. As anyone who has seen some of the musician and film-maker’s previous work will likely guess, this is not a straightforward or predictable film, but ploughs its own furrow, with fourth-wall breaks, touches of the surreal and lots of dark comedy, while still throwing in some commentary to current issues (the use of AI in the creative fields, or the way what opinions you may express could cause you real career harm).

The plot seems very straightforward, the sort of thing you might expect from any romantic comedy – a woman, Florence ( Léa Seydoux), is crazy about a man, David (Louis Garrel). He, in turn, is not very attracted to her (yes, I know, Léa Seydoux!). David has brought his best friend, Willy (Raphaël Quenard) with him, hoping to get him to try and hit on Florence and woo her away from him. Meanwhile, Florence has talked her father, Guillame (Vincent Lindon) into coming with her to a date at a restaurant in the middle of nowhere (the eponymous Le Deuxième Acte), because she wants him to meet David.

So far it all seems like a fairly regular romcom setup, doesn’t it? You await the comedic misunderstandings, the sudden anger and arguments, then the resolution when everyone learns something about themselves and what really matters in their lives. But as I said, this is Dupieux, so nope, that’s not at all what we get. For starters the fourth wall is broken pretty early on as we see David and Willy walking and talking along a deserted, country road, in a long dolly-shot sequence, where the narrative is interrupted as the pair start to bicker about deviating from the script, then, when Willy makes comments about gay, trans and disabled people, is warned he can’t say such things or he will be cancelled, and for goodness sake, he is on film (as David indicates towards the camera).

So early on we’re already realising we are watching two film characters, but these are also actors who are aware they are in a film. This continues when we meet Florence and Guillame, the older actor giving up on their scene and walking away, muttering about the bad dialogue and scenario, as the two begin to argue, until all four end up at the strangely isolated country restaurant. Even there there are deviations from the script, with the actors accusing each other of destroying the scenes, of being unprofessional and so on. At first it seems like it is a film about actors making a film and having problems, but as it goes on it may be that the breaks from the script into personal rants and comments is, in fact, also part of the film they are meant to be shooting.

Add in the fact this film is supposedly written and being directed by an AI (which speaks from a laptop carried by an assistant, and pronounces on the mistakes made by each actor, but how it will fix everything in the edit in post), and you are now really wondering what was real and what was meant to be scripted and what was the actors breaking character, or was it that their character breaks were also actually scripted too? The isolated, strangely deserted location (an old aerodrome in the Dordogne, the runway made to look like a long, deserted, lost highway) adds to the surreal nature of it all.

This could all easily become too much, but with the tight, eighty minute running time, this doesn’t outstay its welcome, and the dark humour throughout had me laughing regularly. Weird, unusual, funny and very meta, just the quick-hit fix for those of us who enjoy the quirkier, odder side of film-making.