When the film begins, we see a 30-ish man with long long strands of badly combed hair dangling down the two sides of his otherwise completely bald head all eagerness in listening to and nervously copying down the opening lines to what's obviously is intended as the ice-breaker to a possible encounter with a member of the opposite sex from a middle-aged female life-coach. He's Bruno Camus (Vincent Macaigne), a successful operator of a dating website! Before long, he gets a telephone message saying that his father is dead and that he is required to attend his funeral at a remote location. He got in touch with his brother, Léon Camus (Laurent Lafitte), an ex-tennis star whose only concern seems to be his flashy out of date red Porsche sports car and whose credit card was rejected when he went to do some supermarket purchases when he's meeting his 10 year-old son Jérôme Camus (Emile Baujar) normally under the custody of his divorced wife Florence (Anne Azoulay). Obviously they haven't got in touch with each other for quite some time. Thinking that they might inherit something from their long absent father, who used to be a doctor but had his license revoked but who still had a lakeside hotel under his name.
When the brothers arrived at the address given in the text message on Bruno's mobile as the funeral home, they found no undertakers, no guests, not even a coffin. But they found a girl in her late 20's who claimed to be their sister, Chloé (Ludivine Sagnier)! They had some serious doubts. But later Chloé was forced to confess that she was really looking desperately for their father and could not think of any other way of getting any clues for that purpose except by doing what she did. Was she one of her father's long string of lovers or really his daughter? But since they were there, they started looking. First they went to that lakeside hotel and found that it was sealed with a court order saying that the property is now under a legal charge for the repayment of their father's debt. Léon went to his room and his father's workshop and found in the latter location an almost completed tennis ball throwing device which their father was building for him, something he told his father he had always wanted. He quickly finished it and discussed how to find their absent father on three deck chairs in the lawn in front of the abandoned hotel shooting the balls into the water but soon one of the balls was retrieved by a dog which brought it back to them. But in no time, a whole pack of dogs appeared with it, all growling. Léon, who's a mortal fear of dogs save their family dog, made an eye signal to the others and all ran for dear life into Léon's Porsche. They drove to find Rebecca, one of the names Léon found among numerous notes or letters by various female names asking his father to contact them and expressing their affection for him. When they reached Rebecca's house, it was empty. In the middle of helping themselves to food and drinks, Rebecca returned and said she did not mind. They got talking. She seems to be living alone and has some fond memories of their father but since he left, she found that she had no reason to want to carry on living, saying she was always hoping that a stranger would suddenly appear one day through the doors of her house which are deliberately left open, and take her life. Suddenly, she felt an urge to dance and danced with the shy Bruno. She wanted to stop but Bruno did not. They got into a quarrel. Suddenly Rebecca got out a gun from her drawer and threatened to kill Bruno and then herself. Not wanting anyone to get seriously hurt or killed, Chloé grabbed a huge crystal ornament lying on a low table at her side and brought it down on Rebecca's head from behind. Rebecca collapsed. They made their escape in Léon's car. As Chloé is a nurse, she knows that Rebecca won't come to any serious harm.
In the middle of the country road, they ran out of gas. Seeing some fireworks over the top of a clump of trees, Léon got an idea. He approached the motor bikes parked near to where several teenagers were launching the rockets at the lakeside pier and stole gas from their tanks but upon being discovered, he poured some petrol on the body of the leader of the teenager group and made as if he would flick his cigarette lighter and then throw it upon the drenched body of the leader of the group were they to show any further signs of resistance. They left without further hassles.
They came to another house on the opposite side of the lake to that of their father's deserted hotel and found one of the teenage girls they met on the previous night basking in the sun, being bored stiff with having nothing interesting to do. She appeared quite friendly and invited Léon into her house where he found, to his surprise, one of his old high school friends who now appears to be down and out too. They reminisced about old times and learned something about his father's being in debt but his high school buddy could not offer any other clue as to his father's whereabouts. They returned to the hotel and found a boat in the middle of the lake. Léon rowed out in another boat but found it empty. The following morning, they found a body floating some way off their house. Chloé said the clothes appeared to be those of their father. The police were called in. The Léon' s high school friend's daughter remarked that it felt like some kind of festivity. The film ends.
It's an unusual film, a bit like a road movie where events just happened by chance with neither any logic nor any ineluctable structure. The only common theme linking them seems to be the failures of all the characters we meet. They are all lacking in one way or another: none are able to cope with "normal" life: whether it be ability to communicate with a member of the opposite sex, ability to deal with personal finance, ability to maintain a stable emotional relationship, ability to retain a lifelong partner, ability to find "meaning" of life.....Is that why the film is called "Tristesse Club" (literally Sadness Club)? The photography is unremarkable, the acting not uniformly good but Vincent Macaigne is good as the socially inept Bruno, Laurent Lafitte good as the impulsive and ostensibly forceful Léon and Ludivine Sagnie good as the uncertain and mysterious Chloé. A film which makes one reflect a little what could have brought those three characters into the way they were, but done in a quirkish and almost comical way.Is the "circle" in the title the circle of the "lake" of love and of life, which brought that particular assortment of life's failures together?
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