5 X 2 (2004)

Gilles: Are you with anyone? Don't you miss it?
Marion: No. Actually it feels good to be alone.......This is hard for me, too.
Gilles: You seem to be holding up pretty well.
Marion: I'm just happy it's over with......What's the matter?
Gilles: I'm just saying you're strong......You get undressed, you get laid, and you're happy. Go get fucked by someone else.
Marion[ screaming]: Shut up!
Gilles: You won.
Marion: I didn't win or lose. It's just over.
Gilles: You're right, as always. It's over. Nothing left to say.........Marion?.....Do you want to try again?

5X2 takes us through the five stages of a couple's marriage and its disintegration in reverse chronological order. The final proceedings of Marion's (Valeria Bruni Tedeschi) and Gilles' (Stephane Freiss) divorce are just done with in the opening scene of the movie and we are taken through the stages of their lives together to see how they got there.

The first scene is followed by a dinner party with Gilles' gay brother and his partner where we see the cracks starting to show. As they discuss about fidelity in a relationship, Gilles narrates in front of his guests about the only time he had cheated on Marion. The whole time his eyes are fixated on her, watching her every move as if to intentionally make her uncomfortable. The third stage is about the time when Marion is in labor due to complications in her delivery, and Gilles, suddenly confused about the arrival of a new member in the family, is nowhere to be seen. We see him sitting inside his car in the rain and finally calling her (after ignoring her mom's messages) when everything is over. The fourth scene takes us to the day of their marriage with all the merry-making and the happiness of two families coming together when two people seem very sure about each other when they say their "I do". And what sadly follows is Gilles falling fast asleep by the time Marion comes over to their bed. "Are you already bored with me?", she asks and takes a walk alone in the night down by the lake where she is almost tempted into adultery. We  don't know whether she goes for it or not, but for sure she seems relieved in the morning when she professes her love for Gilles. The final scene or the first stage of their relationship takes us through how they met at a resort where Gilles is slowly losing interest in his hard-to-impress girlfriend and Marion is spending some alone-time after her break-up four months back with her former Sicilian boyfriend.

The director, Francois Ozon, doesn't pin the blame on anyone for the failure of the relationship, but lets the viewers judge. As it seems, both played their parts, though Gilles would come across as the more self-serving type who can be prone to playing mind games. While Marion is just another ordinary girl who got into a relationship at the wrong time. At times she comes across as strong, but there's always that vulnerability that can break her. She is definitely not someone who can win a psychological game and all she wants is for things to fall into place on their own. We never get to see the fights that are so often imagined as the reason for a relationship's break-down. We also don't see what exactly is it about Marion that has turned Gilles so cold in the marriage. The movie makes a point by showing us a very ordinary couple and how they move from one stage to another with no hint as to what exactly drove them apart. Maybe, in a way, it tells us love and relationships are highly over-rated to start with?

Rating: 7.5/10