Greek Director Athina Rachel Tsangari Takes a Wry Look at Masculinity in ‘Chevalier’

In Movies & TV by Lee Gardnerleave a COMMENT

Male one-upmanship is as old as Cain and Abel. It’s older, probably. Our hominid ancestors no doubt spent their days on the baking savanna competing for food, or for mates, or just to see who could piss the farthest. Masculine rivalry forms the spine for probably half of the stories we’ve ever told ourselves, and it’s the sole focus of Chevalier, the dry, droll new comedy from Greek director Athina Rachel Tsangari.

Six Greek men have booked a luxury yacht for a short vacation cruise. They spend their days spearfishing in the brisk Aegean, and they spend their nights dining, wining, and talking. That talk often turns, as it does among many men, to a not-so-subtle game of display and dominance. The question “What did you catch?” is always a loaded one. Disagreements turn into quiet but grudgeful struggles. By the end of dinner one evening, the friends have resolved to play a game to determine who is “the best in general,” as scored by each other.

As Chevalier unfolds, they pull back the covers on sleeping comrades to evaluate their posture in repose. They compete at chores around the boat—Yannis (Yorgos Pirpassopoulos) finishes first, but his fellows find his silver-polishing shoddy work. They compare morning wood, ringtones, and blood chemistry. They listen in on phone calls home to weigh who’s happiest with their significant other. They make notes on each other in little notebooks. They stay on the boat long after it docks, and pull out all the stops, determined to come to a judgment on which of them trumps all the others.

This is familiar turf for Tsangari, who is part of a new school of Greek filmmakers who slyly prod at humans at our most subconsciously driven and weirdest. She is a past collaborator of Yorgos Lanthimos, the auteur behind The Lobster and Dogtooth, and she cowrote Chevalier with Efthymis Filippou, who’s cowritten Lanthimos’ last three films. Tsangari’s previous film, 2010’s Attenberg, shared her colleagues’ deadpan absurdity and nature film-like observations of what odd, compulsive creatures we are. She also shares Lanthimos’ watchful, canny directorial skill.

Chevalier is more naturalistic, and more plausible in the world offscreen, than any of the above. Doughy manboy Dimitris (Makis Papadimitriou) might seem like a type at first, but Tsangari spends enough time on him to flesh out at least two and a half dimensions. She drops enough hints at the vanity and eccentricity of aging Josef (Vangelis Mourikis) that by the time he’s wandering the yacht’s narrow halls with a hard-on, hoping to display it to the jury of his peers to offset a poor showing that morning, it doesn’t seem too far-fetched. Handsome Christos (Sakis Rouvas) might seem like shoo-in for the winner, but the pressure of constant competition—and some prodding at his vulnerabilities—nearly unmans him.

The overarching joke here, of course, is that little of what the men on the boat do or say is that far removed from the sort of microaggressive jousting that most men inflict and endure every single day. Here they openly tsk over a paunch or a secret cigarette habit, instead of just doing it in their heads like everyone else. As ridiculous and petty as Tsangari makes their preening and bloody-mindedness seem, there is a core of sympathy to her portrayal. Many of their perceived weaknesses come from aging, from a kind heart, from a vulnerability they can hardly be blamed for. Toward the end, bearded Yorgos (Panos Koronis) makes a dramatic gesture to show off his manliness, but it can also be read as an abject plea for connection rather than competition. After all, who absorbs a higher dose of toxic masculinity than men themselves? The gamesmanship is all the more sad because the stakes are ultimately so low.

The stakes are a bit low for Chevalier itself as well. Tsangari sets up her premise with care and manages its progress adroitly. She resists total farce with admirable steadiness. But the low-key slow-burn pace and the wry chuckles that land every few minutes don’t feel quite like the anti-Apatow tonic they probably should. The men go back to their lives on land having learned nothing, which is fine. But neither have we.

The Public Cinema screens Chevalier at the Knoxville Museum of Art on Sunday, Sept. 25, at 2 p.m. Admission is free. 

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