Want to have an explanation on the end of the film “Les Appearances” with Karin Viard and Benjamin Biolay? The director had given some answers at the time of the release of this Chabrolian thriller.
Appearances: Karin Viard in a Chabrolian thriller
Released on French screens in September 2020, Appearances is a film directed by Marc Fitoussi and freely adapted of the novel Betrayed by the Swedish Karin Alvtegen published in 2003. It takes place in Vienna, within the small community of French expatriates.
This is where Eve and Henri live, young parents of a little Malo, who have everything to be happy. He is the conductor of the Opera, she works at the French Institute. But their life changes the day when Henri succumbs to the charm of their son’s teacher, Tina.
In the cast of this Chabrolian thriller, we find Karin Viard in the role of Eve, Benjamin Biolay in that of Henri and Laetitia Dosch in the role of the mistress (in every sense of the word).
An open end
The film ends with an argument between Eve and Henri. The latter reproaches him for not having left him earlier so as not to lose face, and for having attacked Tina. Also, he can no longer live with the guilt of killing someone. with the help of his wife. He therefore decides to leave her and stay in Vienna while she returns to Paris.
Later in the evening, Eve decides to take a tour of the city in a horse-drawn carriage, alone. Appearances ends with an enigmatic camera look from Karin Viard. What does it mean? The director explained this when the film was released:
Henri ends up blowing up the whole system of appearances. And Eve agrees with her mother while leaving uncertainty about her future. This end is open: we can say to ourselves that Eve has freed herself from the hypocrisy of appearances, but there is also her enigmatic smile and we can just as well think that she is not going to abandon this bourgeois environment and that she will meet another husband who will allow her to return to this environment. Eve may not have said her last word. This final shot is undecidable and leaves the viewer free to read.
