Virginie Efira, a captive of love in L’Amour et les Forêts (Just the Two of Us) by Valérie Donzelli

L'AMOUR ET LES FORÊTS © 2023 Rectangle Productions-France 2 Cinéma-Les Films de Françoise- Thibault Graber

Eight years after her selection In Competition for Marguerite et Julien (Marguerite & Julien), Valérie Donzelli is back at Cannes, along with Virginie Efira and Melvil Poupaud, for L’Amour et les Forêts (Just the Two of Us). Adapted from the novel of the same name by Éric Reinhardt, the film can be seen at Cannes Première and comes out in theatres in France the same day.

Blanche falls hard for Grégoire. He has everything going for him, and the passion between the two of them grows very fast: they marry and live together. But what happens next is not a fairy tale. Blanche is isolated from those close to her, from her twin sister especially, and ends up falling into the trap of a possessive and dangerous man.

L’Amour et les Forêts (Just the Two of Us) depicts the control and violence women suffer. Written with Audrey Diwan, the film is not particularly interested in suspense and in the outcome that usually drives such dramas. The focus is on the mechanism of control, and also on confidence, on the capacity to break the silence. Valérie Donzelli has plunged into the grey zones, those where the victim feels compelled to compromise, and where the abuser vacillates between tenderness and violence.

To portray this couple, Valérie Donzelli has called on two actors, friends in real life, Virgine Efira and Melvil Poupaud. The Belgian actress was an obvious choice when the idea for this adaptation was developed: “She generates empathy, regardless of the character she portrays. She could play the worst of monsters and we’d still love her, at least a little.”

Then came the idea for Melvil Poupaud to play Grégoire. “I really wanted to create a bastard on screen. Neat and tidy, dry, tense”, explains the actor. “A man of peaceful appearance but profoundly dark on the inside.” A kind of role Poupaud hasn’t often done, and which should pique one’s curiosity.