Debut feature from French-Portuguese actor-turned-filmmaker Ruben Alves, THE GILDED CAGE’s story originates from his own parents, who are Portuguese immigrants and have found their feet living in France.

Hailed from Portugal, Maria and José Ribeiro (Blanco and de Almeida) have been married and lived in Paris for 30 years and have two children Paula (Cabrita) and Pedro (Pereira), Maria works as a concierge of a verdant house, owned by the haughty Madame Reichert (Croisille) and José is a foreman of a construction company headed by Francis Caillaux (Giraud). After receiving an unexpected heritage in their homeland, the couple mulls over the eventuality of moving back, before they can even break the news, people in their vicinity have already got wind of it, and from Madame Reichert and her lodgers, Francis, to Maria’s own sister Lourdes (Corado), everyone has their own vested interest in keeping them stay put, with no respect that it is actually the Ribeiros who should call the shots. At the receiving end of an increased salary, a renovation of Maria’s lodge, and the tidings that their brother-in-law, Lourdes’ husband Carlos (Martins) is in severe health condition, Maria and José are mutedly nonplussed by these deterrents in disguise.

The couple’s vacillation compounds when Paula reveals that she is dating Francis’ son Charles (Gautry) and now she is expecting, after a home dinner to meet their future in-laws goes amusingly awry (Chantal Lauby single-handedly steals the limelight with her incessant infelicities as Solange, Francis’ Google-prone, benighted wife and Charles’ mother), they are fed up being a brace of soft-touches, enough of “trop bon, trop con”, however, their belatedly rebellion backfires when dissension arises between themselves, leave or stay, on screen, it only takes a fado’s time to find a satisfactory ending for everyone involved.

Basking in a twee atmosphere of feel-goodism and predictability, overlaid by a golden hue overdosing on coziness, THE GILDED CAGE plays its crowd-pleasing card straight, tentatively wades into the themes of class boundary and inferiority complex from an ethnic lineage, but every fiber of it leads us to its designated ending with duly precision sans any surprise (everyone who has watched a substantial quality of movies will have known the ropes by now), only chuckles now and then (cultural differentiation is a gold mine for jokes), and a superficial contentment that does not sit well with this reviewer’s critical yardstick.

Thanks to the unforced performances from both Blanco and de Almeida, THE GILDED CAGE retains its freewheeling pace safely to the finish line, nostalgic but also uplifting in its core, a utopian actualization of a story with its agitation, obfuscation and disappointment punctiliously white-washed, all we can say is, family trumps everything and what a wonderful family!

referential entries: Emanuele Crialese’s TERRAFIRMA (2011, 6.6/10); Jacques Audiard’s DHEEPAN (2015, 7.1/10).

組里的意大利小哥哥每兩周組織一次國際電影俱樂部，來自天南海北各個國家各個大洲的人聚在一起，選一部最能體現(xiàn)自己國家文化歷史風土人情的電影，大家一起看，然后討論文化差異。今天是來自葡萄牙的David，選了一部講述葡萄牙移民在法國的故事，因為經(jīng)濟不景氣葡萄牙人大批移民到法國，沒有合法身份只能齟齬社會底層做體力活，哪怕在某一方面做的出類拔萃也會因為移民身份不被認可。電影里居住在法國的一家葡萄牙人在富人家里做管家，周圍都是浪漫矯揉做作富麗堂皇的法蘭西風格，而進了主人公家里卻是葡萄牙風情，吃的穿的，都秉承葡萄牙文化，在外卻羞于提及自己葡萄牙的身份，這些人回到葡萄牙后，又會因自己曾經(jīng)移居法國，被家鄉(xiāng)的人另眼相看，于是成為邊緣人，在兩個國度，兩個文化之間徘徊，哪個都不能完全融入。 他們勉強的笑，他們的卑微，無力，都是異鄉(xiāng)人的寂寞。 有沒有一部簡簡單單的，從尋常人家角度拍中國移民的電影，不要像中國合伙人那樣單一的亞文化下的成功定義，也不要像都挺好里的老大哥打腫臉充胖子式的苦大仇深。只是一個普普通通工薪家庭，父母慈愛，孩子善良努力，冷靜客觀的第三視角帶入看異鄉(xiāng)人日常生活中瑣瑣碎碎的窘迫，小心翼翼，寂寞，比如像失落東京里的英國人用日本的跑步機，語音提示是日語導致他不能控制速度，比如鐘情美食的中國人每次都做好豐盛一頓午餐去工作，和同事一起吃飯的時候別人只吃三明治喝酸奶，他想融入當?shù)氐纳钣谑且矊W著吃三明治，然而還是不習慣，入夜最后一個鏡頭是躺在他午餐盒里沒有被吃掉的三明治，第二天被丟到垃圾桶。還有伴隨著這些細小的失落下，他收獲的不一樣色彩的開心，還有倍加珍惜的溫暖。 我又想起來自也門的同事，他幾乎不參加這樣的文化交流活動，我設想他如果加入，他會帶來什么樣的電影? 唯一我知道的就是"何以為家" ，戰(zhàn)亂，貧窮，饑餓，不受教育的人們，只生不養(yǎng)的父母…這就是他們的現(xiàn)狀，因此他不加入，讓我覺得有些悲傷，這世界上最隨機又沒邏輯的事就是我們不能選擇自己出生在哪里，在什么樣的家庭，因為隨機，我便覺得這并不能是一個人喜歡或者不喜歡一個國家，一個文化的理由，我們來自哪里也不應該定義我們是誰，但這想法是最不實際的了。 該如何定義個人與國家的關系，我討厭愛國主義，討厭集體主義，討厭一切想要煽動集體情緒的文化灌輸，但我也不能不承認，不管我愛不愛，根扎在那里，那種親切感和歸屬感怎么也改變不了。說愛國，不如說愛家鄉(xiāng)，愛那里的記憶，親人，和朋友。愛國是統(tǒng)治階級的謊話。 聽朋友告訴我，在美洲某個法外海域，有一艘巨型航母，專門供世界富豪做非法交易，只要你有錢，就能無盡的釋放人的本性，欲望，惡，貪婪，廣告就放在洋蔥瀏覽器上。 這該說是人性，還是人性的迷失?