Man On The Train

By PETER CALDER

Herald rating: * * * *

At once slight and solemn, sweet and astringently sad, this delicately inflected film from one of the French screen's modern masters is a genuine treat.

It's a sort of comedy - though there's not really a laugh-out-loud moment in it - and at times it's a sort of drama, too. But mainly it's a rueful meditation on the nature of masculinity and male friendship.

Much of its pungency derives from the unlikely casting which pairs the moustached, vaguely chook-like Rochefort, the veteran of 130 roles, with Hallyday, a still legendary 60s rock star who, as Le Roi de Rock, was as big a sensation in Francophone countries as he was unknown abroad.

Rochefort's last screen appearance was painfully undignified: his prostate was one of many problems which turned a Don Quixote film into the "unmaking of" documentary Lost in La Mancha. But here he is back on top form as Manesquier, a retired schoolteacher in a small, deeply sleepy town in the French Alps, where his life is almost as drab and grey as the shuttered and empty streets.

His routine is interrupted when he offers new arrival Milan (Hallyday), the titular man on the train, a glass of water and then a few days' lodging in the sprawling, expensively cluttered house he has occupied since his mother's death. Soon we become aware that Milan is planning a holdup of the town bank on the same day as Manesquier is due to undergo surgery.

But in the meantime a guardedly affectionate relationship develops between two men, who are a study in contrasts.

What gradually becomes clear is that each longs for the life the other represents. The older man covets the stranger's cool leathers and the maverick of no fixed abode is gruffly in awe of the teacher's shambling homeliness, tattered slippers and elephantine memory for poetry.

These complementary longings are encapsulated in two key scenes: in one, of beautifully understated whimsy, Manesquier dons Milan's fabulously fringed jacket and struts before the mirror; in the other the tough guy flexes his muscles for a bar fight that the older man defuses effortlessly.

The strikingly unrealistic ending seems like a jarring change of tone although there's a case to be made that the film has taken place in the sort of twilight zone it finishes in. In any case it overworks an idea that the film has delicately hinted at all along. But it can do little to mar the impact of a subtle and enjoyable film.

Cast: Johnny Hallyday, Jean Rochefort Director: Patrice Leconte Running time: 90 minutes. Rating: M (violence, offensive language) Screening: Lido