In ‘Happening,’ a riveting drama on pregnancy
“Happening,” Audrey Diwan's Golden Lion-winner at last year's Venice Film Festival, is set in 1963 France but the period detail isn't prominent. Instead, it's an abortion tale that feels as though it could it could take place in many places, long ago or today.
It's filmed in square-like academy ratio and it's as if the edges of the frame are closing in on Anne Duchesne (Anamaria Vartolomei), a smart literature student — maybe even a brilliant one; we see her define “anaphora” without hesitation — who is shocked when a doctor informs her that she's pregnant.
This is 12 years before abortion would be legalized in France and Anne's predicament is immediately urgent. “Do something,” she tells the doctor, who replies that it's impossible, “the law is unsparing.” For Anne, her apparently first sexual encounter threatens to derail her life just as it's getting started. She comes from a working class background. Her parents — and most of all Anne, herself — have high expectations for her.
Films from Cristian Mungiu's “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days” to Eliza Hittman's “Never Sometimes Always Rarely” have captured the human toll of systems that give women little choice when faced with an unwanted pregnancy. What distinguishes “Happening,” Diwan's second feature film, is, overwhelmingly, her and Laurent Tangy's tightly composed cinematography and Vartolomei's riveting, steely performance. To a remarkable degree, “Happening” is viscerally connected with its protagonist, closely detailing not just her navigation of social taboos and restrictions but capturing her unapologetic determination. It's a movie about abortion, yes, but it's also a coming-ofage tale about a woman's resolve.
“Happening,” which opens in select theaters Friday and expands afterward, is based on the 2001 memoir by celebrated French author Annie Ernaux, who framed her ‘60s experience as it was recalled decades later by sifting through old journals and memories. Diwan's film has no such framework, instead preferring to stay rigorously close to Anne's experience as it's unfolding. Abortion is to even her friends an unspeakable subject; just the hint of promiscuity is enough to make her nearly an outcast.
“Happening,” an IFC Films release, is rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America for disturbing material/ images, sexual content and graphic nudity. In French with subtitles. Running time: 100 minutes.