Le jeu réal. par Fred Cavayé (review)

According to Statista.com, France was home to over 45 million mobile phone users in 2018. The ubiquitous smartphone takes center stage in Le jeu (Netflix release). Main character Marie (Bérénice Bejo) describes the device as the "black box" for couples: "Imagine the number of divorces if everyone snooped through their partner's phone." Her remark provides the impetus for the eponymous game that dominates what was intended to be a "lunar eclipse" dinner party for old friends hosted by Marie and her husband Vincent (Stéphane De Groodt). In order to prove that they have nothing to hide, the three couples and Ben (Grégory Gadebois)—his date, he says, is home with a stomach virus—agree (some more reluctantly than others) to leave their phones visible on the table so that all texts can be read and all calls can be answered via speaker phone. Over the course of the dinner, the phones reveal secrets that their owners would prefer to keep hidden. Reminiscent of Francis Veber's Le dîner de cons (1998), which takes place almost entirely in the co-protagonist's Parisian apartment, the setting of Cavayé's film is limited to Marie and Vincent's apartment building and, as texts and phone calls buzz and ring, the enclosed space becomes more and more confining. Veber's title could easily be swapped for that of Cavayé's film inasmuch as the latter is, for all intents and purposes, a catalog of and testament to the ways in which contemporary technology makes fools of all of us. A lighter, more comedic take on Black Mirror, the film highlights the ways in which we interact with and react to smartphones. Ben uses a selfie stick to document the evening with a photo and later leaps up from the dinner table when an app tells him (in English) to do jumping jacks. Several characters challenge each other on seemingly trivial aspects related to cell phone culture—for example, how they choose to name their contacts—while other characters interrogate their partners regarding their relationships with people whom they purportedly "only know on Facebook." The film is a remake of Paolo Genovese's Perfetti Sconosciuti (Perfect Strangers), a film whose title elucidates how little these characters know about each other—not only as lovers, but also as friends. Given the serious nature of multiple revelations, it seems inevitable that the dinner game will sever romantic ties and friendships indefinitely. If there is fault to be found with the film, it is perhaps its ending. An abrupt shift occurs within the span of one shot, as everything the viewer has learned about the dinner party is questioned in the final sequence. The film's content—both in subject and maturity level—is likely appropriate for young adult viewing, though the film's focus on contemporary technology may potentially render it outdated faster than one can say "Allô?"