Louis Garrel Ditches Heartthrob Image in New Comedy
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- Louis Garrel stars as Yves, a kitchen-appliance executive hiding his job loss from his family, in Just an Illusion — his first role deliberately playing against type, with bouffy hair, a Ron Burgundy moustache and a billowing beige trenchcoat.
- "Just an Illusion" is directed by Éric Toledano and Olivier Nakache (the duo behind Untouchable), set in 1980s suburban Paris, and threads Franco-German reconciliation, the 1870 Crémieux Decree, the rise of the Front National and anti-racism concerts into its domestic comedy.
- Garrel says the role freed him from vanity: "I don't care if I look good, and most of the time you are better on screen when you don't care" — adding that hearing audiences laugh at him on screen is now "what I'm waiting for."
- The film is Garrel's 62nd acting credit and his first to seriously interrogate fatherhood, mirroring his own life: he separated last year from Laetitia Casta after eight years of marriage and is father to a five-year-old son and an 18-year-old adopted daughter, Oumy Bruni Garrel.
- Garrel hails from an acting dynasty — mother Brigitte Sy, father Philippe Garrel, grandfather Maurice Garrel — but says Oumy has chosen to study anthropology, sociology and philosophy over acting, a choice he calls "a small rebellion."
- "Just an Illusion" opened as a hit in France this spring and releases in UK and Irish cinemas on 11 September; Garrel will next lead Nanni Moretti's It Will Happen Tonight later this year.
Why it matters: For an actor built on being cinema's smouldering 'erotic wrecking ball,' Garrel now saying he prefers being laughed at on screen marks a deliberate late-career pivot, and pairing that instinct with the *Untouchable* directing duo — whom the source calls 'a major guarantee of box office success' — gives the dorky new image serious commercial backing.
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