100 Hot Men and a Dame: #100 Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet

100. Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet

Occupation: Actor

Nationality: French

Age: 23

Best Known For: His performance in Christophe Honoré's Les Chansons d'Amour [Love Songs] (outside of France, anyways).

Welcome to my first post in this exciting countdown! Joining me today is mon ami Dave, famous for his world-class blog and Tumblr and we will be discussing up-and-coming French actor Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet.

Dame James: When did you first encounter Grégoire and, if it wasn't love at first sight, when did you fall in love with him?

Dave: I think it's probably standard for any Grégoire admirer that the first encounter was through Les chansons d'amour. Let's be honest, would he even touch this list without it? I mean, I DID see his arse in La princesse de Montpensier, but he really got the duff part there - sure, Gaspard Ulliel is hot too, but that princess really didn't seem to see what she was missing in her bed chambers, and the film agreed with her. Which is a large part of why it was so rubbish, I'd wager.

But back to those chansons. It was pretty much inevitable that I was going to fall over head over heels for the plucky, encouraging, adorably fluffy-haired gay boy whose pursuit of Louis Garrel might be creepy and perverted in someone else's hands, but who WOULDN'T want Grégoire pulling you by the hand into the sack? The scenes between Garrel and Grégoire are pretty much my ideal of love, and that's probably not very good for me since no one as beautiful exists, but it's nice to lose myself in the fantasy.

Dame James: No, I'd wager that Grégoire wouldn't have snuck in this list without the help of Les Chanson d'Amour but what a way to make a splash! I'm pretty sure I mentioned in my review of the film that he was, indeed, kinda creepy and stalker-ish but I'll be damned if he didn't make that desirable. And Grégoire, for once, made Garrel seem like a normal guy and not the sexed-up horn dog he is in nearly ever film I've ever seen him in.

I think a good portion of Grégoire's charm is, like you said, he (along with Garrel) represents an ideal love in Les Chansons d'Amour. He's not a walking sex god like Garrel, Ulliel or countless other French actors we've been accustomed to over the years. Grégoire has the "Léaud Factor"; he's adorable and charming precisely because of how "normal" he is and how much he appears to be a regular, everyday guy. His good looks are just the best bonus ever.

I am so glad that you brought up La Princesses de Montpensier because I was seriously going to bring it up for the "arse" factor. But since we've both seen it, I have to say I completely agree about your assessment of Grégoire's role in it. Neither the princess nor the film seem to realize that Grégoire was not exactly a terrible catch. Red Riding Hood is another recent example of this and I was just as dumbfounded at its insistence that Amanda Seyfried would not be the slightest bit attracted to Max Irons. I am grateful that we got to see his rear in Princesse but it was a terrible casting choice (and it was not the ONLY problem with that movie).

Silly question time! Since Grégoire starred in Les Chansons d'Amour, which translates to Love Songs, what love song would you like him to sing to you with his lovely voice? Oh, and I suppose we should talk about his singing voice being another reason why he's amazing.

Dave: I'll start with the final question. I was musing over this earlier, sure I'd never come up with a nice answer - but then, for whatever reason, Marilyn Monroe singing "I wanna be loved by you, just you, nobody else but you" came into my head. And I think it would be perfect. It totally fits the kind of breathy non-singing they do in Les chansons d'amour and it's the kind of thing Erwann (his character - I admit, I only know that because I have the film playing as I write this) would sing. Grégoire, naturally, has a lovely voice - kind of rich and tremulous - but I think it's the earnestness and sweetness he sings with that really makes their duets in particular so perfect.

Absolutely with you on how his normality is what makes him so charming. Garrel mocks Grégoire's Breton jumper and looks like his usual stylishly offbeat tousled-haired sex god self, but Grégoire just has overgrown hair and an oversized puffa jacket. He's the normal guy seeing sadness in the usually untouchable Garrel, and reaching out to him. So his obsessiveness never seems lecherous, because it seems full of such genuine concern. Their romantic scenes are so beautiful because they mix a teenage horniness with what is clearly genuine affection and caring instincts on Erwann's part. He's enthralled by Garrel, but never stops being concerned for his potential sadness.

Oh, and he does have a very nice arse.

Dame James: Oooh, I'm liking your love song answer! It's both a good song and perfect for Grégoire's voice. I'd go with "Stickwitu" by The Pussycat Dolls. I will concede that it's not nearly as brilliant a choice as yours, but I really dig that song and I think I'd die from happiness listening to him try to wrap his French tongue around such an Americanized expression like "stickwitu".

I feel terrible that we keep going on and on about Les Chansons d'Amour--and I do agree with your assessment of his and Garrel's relationship and why it's so fascinating--but not a bunch of his work has been made available in the US (or UK in your case, Dave), as far as I know. I have seen La Belle Personne but that was a horrendous waste of Grégoire's talent. Then again, aside from "Les Chansons d'Amour", Christophe Honoré really has reduced some quite amazing actors to being mind-blowingly godawful. Montpensier was also another waste of his talent, although, if you get the chance, fast forward about a half hour in and just watch Grégoire's arse. You won't be disappointed.

Then again, I think it's quite remarkable that we've both latched onto this actor just because of this one role. It's not every actor who can so firmly plant himself in the mind of many with just one performance, especially when they're acting with one of the five sexiest living French actors. For that alone, I will be a firm devotee of his. Any final thoughts, Dave? Also, have you seen any other work of his that you could recommend? I just added something called Black Heaven to my Netflix queue that sounded interesting.

Dave: I've not seen him in anything other than the two aforementioned, sadly. He seems to be in a lot of war films, they're the only other available features over here! Black Heaven sounds intriguing if almost sure to be terrible because it concerns video games.

But surely his moment is yet to come (well, his second moment). Personally I'd enjoy seeing him make his way around all five of the sexiest living French actors - maybe some sort of quadrilogy? As long as America doesn't get its hands on him, he needs to stay adorably, naively, beautifully French.

 

Because Americans tend to ruin everything that was once good, I totally agree he should stay in France. And what do you all think? Are you as smitten with Grégoire as Dave and I are or he is just another young French actor (quelle horror!)

Christophe Honoré Can Suck My Balls: Rants on La Belle Personne

If Christophe Honoré is the voice of the new French cinema, then France may as well call it a day and just stop making movies altogether. I know I've already complained about him ad nauseum after Dans Paris, but his latest film, La Belle Personne, was just too awful to ignore. I can't believe I waited four months for the English subtitles to appear online.

If you're wondering why I bothered watching yet another Honoré movie, I can honestly say I'm not so sure myself. For some reason, I thought that since Love Songs wasn't horrible (original review) and showed some promise that was absent in Ma Mère and Dans Paris, maybe his next one would be even better. I really should have known better. Honoré has a keen knack for suckering me in with either an interesting premise or fantastic A-List cast and then make my life hell with a hellish movie. He got me this time with the 1-2 punch of Louis Garrel and Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet. Unfortunately, there's no making out between the two of them in this one and that's only the beginning of the disappointments with La Belle Personne.

The film starts off with a bang, oddly enough, which only furthers the disappointment later on. The young students who dominate La Belle Personne are all introduced in this heavily understated opening taking place in their English classroom. They're supposed to be listening to some inane conversation in English on a cassette tape; instead, however, the camera follows their gazes between each other, sometimes reciprocated but often times not. I found it an interesting and thrifty way to set up relationships between the main characters--what could have been a lengthy introduction spread over multiple scenes or, heaven forbid, done with a voiceover, is instead captured in a minute or two without a word between any of them. Better still, Honoré's annoying Nouvelle Vague tendencies are completely extricated. Gone are the annoyingly random jump cuts that distract from more than they add to the scene. In my head, I was already doing cartwheels in celebration: Honoré had finally reined it in!

The rest of the film, unfortunately, doesn't live up to the standards of the opening. La Belle Personne revolves around Junie (Léa Seydoux), a blankly mysterious girl whom the main characters Otto (Leprince-Ringuet) and Nemours (Garrel) both fall hard for. She's the sort of character that stares blankly off in the distance whenever someone asks about her mysterious past and we're supposed to interpret that silence as an in-depth analysis of everything we could ever understand about her. In case you didn't catch my sarcasm, I can't stand and don't entirely understand films that use this as a plot device. I don't find it interesting in the slightest and actually find the whole thing desperately shallow. Some people may find deep reservations of feelings and a whole backstory hidden in that gaze; I just see emptiness. La Belle Personne falls into the same trap. The whole movie is so nicely photographed and nicely edited that it all becomes boring after awhile. I can only take so many scenes of people staring at each other or confronting someone about why they're not sharing their emotions with them. By the end of the movie, this tedium gets to the point where I was wishing for Honoré's crazy jump cuts. And you know that's never a good sign. D

I Wish I Had a Legitimate Excuse to Post These Pictures...

...other than the fact that, you know, good looking, young French boys make me weak in the knees. As an added bonus, they're wearing suits and skinny ties and that drives the French New Wave fanboy inside of me crazy. I found these pictures about a month ago here, but since I don't speak much French I have no idea what they were shot for (other than a reason to assemble a smorgasbord of hot French people). In the end though, all that matters is that there are a bunch of pretty French hommes to gaze at:

Julien Baumgartner

François Civil

Théo Frilet

Adrien Jolivet

Guillaume Gouix

Emile Berling (whom you might recognize as a Diva Cup nominee for Breakthrough Performance for A Christmas Tale)

And, of course, I saved the best for last: none other than Mr. Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet himself in all of his sexy, smoldering glory (also a Breakthrough Performance nominee with Berling)

Marry, Boff, Kill

J.D. had this fun little meme of sorts on his blog last night and I decided (perhaps foolishly) to take part in it. Here are the rules:

1) Comment to this and I will give you 3 people.
2) Post this meme with your answers.
3) Provide pictures and the names of 3 people.
4) Label which you would marry, shag, and throw off a cliff.

I thought for sure that J.D. would be totally evil and either pick three men I absolutely adore or three men I completely abhor just so I would have to make the ultimate Sophie's choice. Fortunately, he decided to be somewhat nice and picked Kris Allen, Dev Patel and Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet. Let's get started, shall we?

MARRY
Kris Allen
I'm pretty sure I made this perfectly clear yesterday.

BOFF
Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet
Because he's adorable, legitimately do-able and, if I married him, someone might be a little pissed at me.

On a completely random side note: While I was looking for photos of Grégoire for this post, I ran across this photo of him and some guy named Esteban Carvajal Alegria. I immediately rushed over to IMDb, hoping to find out something about this mystery man and I was a little stunned by my discovery. He only has about 10 film and TV credits, but he shares at least 8 of them with Grégoire! Isn't that odd? Any thoughts out there?

KILL
Dev Patel
In all honesty, I was holding out hope for a three-way with Dev and Zac Efron (since Zac is clearly in love with Dev and they're going to announce their relationship anyday now). But, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I would rather have Zac all to myself. Sorry Dev, those are the breaks.

That was fun. Anyone up for this on their own blog?

Qu'est-ce que les français ont été jusqu'à?: Short Rants on Les Chanson d'Amour [Love Songs] and Tell No One

Les Chansons d'Amour [Love Songs] (Christophe Honoré, 2008): Well, at least it was a major improvement over Ma Mère. There's something about Honoré's erratic, actor-unfriendly direction that doesn't work for me. What takes place in individual scenes is usually very interesting, but the way Honoré connects (or, shall I say, doesn't connect) eliminates any chance for dramatic effect. Just like I complained about in Ma Mère, the characters do complete 180's between consecutive scenes (Garrel's character literally went from "Get away, stalker" to "I think I'm in love" with Leprince-Ringuet's character in a matter of two scenes) and erases any chance for proper character development. How can we get to know these characters and relate to them when their reaction to anything and everything happening is chopped away and we are left to guess how they bridged the gap between two very different emotional states? Some may think I'm just lazy for not connecting the dots, but I think Honoré is lazy for not providing a few more dots. I pity the poor actors, which include Honoré fave Louis Garrel, Ludvine Sagnier and talented newcomer Gregoire Leprince-Ringuet, who are forced to act here without much to go on or really do. They try their damndest, but it is freaking hard trying to make characters from ideas and vignettes of people.

The brilliant thing about Les Chansons d'Amour, however, is the use of musical numbers in the narrative. They aren't used like the musical numbers in HSM3, which are mainly for entertainment purposes only; in Les Chansons d'Amour, the songs allow the characters to express themselves and their unusual relationships in ways that they can't in the "real" world of speaking and communicating with each other. When Julie and Ismael, in another one of their numerous and ongoing fights, suddenly break out into song with Alice trying to unite them, it is not merely to entertain us for a few minutes. With her constant interruptions into their fighting and literally stepping between them, trying to unite them together through her, we finally understand her role in the threesome relationship that they have developed. While the lyrics don't translate so well in English sometimes, the music is often times beautiful and completely captures the emotions they are trying to portray. Dramatically, the film is kind of a bust, but with an interesting use of musical numbers and game cast members, Les Chansons d'Amour sort of redeems itself by the end. Sort of. B-

Tell No One (Guillaume Canet, 2008): Whoever described this film as "Hitchcockian" was entirely accurate; the fact that it's more Saboteur than The 39 Steps or North By Northwest seems to have been left out, unfortunately. For a two hour, edge-of-your-seat thriller, this film felt like it dragged on for at least 4 and a half (Gone With the Wind feels infinitely shorter in comparison). I kept waiting for something in the first twenty minutes to grab my attention and make me care in the slightest about any of the main character, but, alas, the wait was in vain. By the time Francois Cluzet's character is about to be taken in by the police for the murder of his dead wife's friend and he decides to run away from the police because he's innocent (my least favorite cliché in the history of film, FYI), all I kept hoping was that someone would catch him, put him in jail and give him the electric chair. With a main character you can't root for, plot twists that lead to incessant and annoying dead ends and scenes that just go nowhere and somehow feel boring, Tell No One is quite possibly one of the biggest duds of the year. And was anyone else annoyed as hell by the ending? Why are you bothering to tell me one 10 minute explanation when most of it's a lie and then you are forced to spend another 5 minuted telling me what really happened? Blurg, this movie was awful and another entry into my future book, This Film is Good?!: Films Beloved by Critics of All Sorts that Suck Major Ass. D+