Her ability to perceive her customers' desires and satisfy them with just the right confection, coaxes the villagers to abandon themselves to temptation - just as Lent begins. Within days, she opens an unusual chocolate shop, across the square from the church. That'll be-as John Wayne once said-the day.When mysterious Vianne and her child arrive in a tranquil French town in the winter of 1959, no one could have imagined the impact that she and her spirited daughter would have on the community stubbornly rooted in tradition. I enjoyed the movie on its own sweet level, while musing idly on the box-office prospects of a film in which the glowing, life-affirming local Christians prevailed over glowering, prejudiced, puritan and bitter Druid worshippers. Even Reynaud is converted and is shocked when he finds that his reckless language has inspired a local dimwit to set a dangerous fire. ![]() It goes without saying in such stories that organized religion is the province of prudes and hypocrites, but actually "Chocolat" is fairly easy on the local establishment-they're not evil people, although they resent outsiders like the Depp character they're more like tranquil sleepwalkers who wake up to smell the coffee, or in this case, the chocolate. It's the sort of movie you can enjoy as a superior fable, in which the values come from children's fairy tales but adult themes have been introduced. "Chocolat" was directed by Lasse Hallstrom (" The Cider House Rules," " What's Eating Gilbert Grape," "My Life as a Dog"). Even Armande ( Judi Dench), Vianne's opinionated old landlady, melts under the influence and ends her long hostility to her daughter ( Carrie-Anne Moss). One confection seems to work like Viagra, while others inspire love, not lust, and inspire an old man ( John Wood) to screw up his courage and confess to a local widow ( Leslie Caron) that he has adored her forever. Vianne's chocolates contain magic ingredients like the foods in "Like Water for Chocolate," and soon her shop is a local healing center. She does, however, have an interest in the opposite sex, represented by Roux ( Johnny Depp), who anchors his houseboat in the nearby river and shocks the bourgeoisie with his communal lifestyle. It is a convention in such stories that husbands tend toward wife-beating, and a quiet argument is made for the superior state of Vianne, who is the unmarried mother of Anouk ( Victoire Thivisol), and thus harbors no potential brute beneath her roof. ![]() There are troubles in the town, quickly confided to Vianne, who consoles Josephine ( Lena Olin) after she is beaten by her husband Serge ( Peter Stormare). The town, religious and morally strict, is against them, as they represent free-thinking and indulgence. Reynaud styles himself as the local arbiter of morals, even writing the sermons which Father Henri ( Hugh O'Conor) delivers from the pulpit while the complacent aristocrat's lips move contentedly in unison. A mother and daughter move to a small French town where they open a chocolate shop. The town is ruled by Comte de Reynaud ( Alfred Molina), whose wealth and books do not console him for the absence of his wife, who is allegedly visiting Venice, but may just have packed up and moved out. Whether her character has deeper agendas, whether she is indeed a witch, as some believe, or a pagan priestess, as she seems to hint, is left unresolved by the movie-but anyone who schedules a fertility celebration up against Easter Sunday is clearly picking a fight. Directed by Lasse Hallstrom written by Robert Nelson Jacobs, based on the novel by Joanne Harris director of photography, Roger Pratt edited by Andrew Mondshein music by Rachel. ![]() Like Catherine Deneuve's, her beauty is not only that of youth, but will carry her through life, and here she looks so ripe and wholesome that her very presence is an argument against the local prudes. ![]() The movie is charming and whimsical, and Binoche reigns as a serene and wise goddess.
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