Conversations de salon II

There are always four together, always in the same decor, two armchairs, a coffee table and a sofa. Faces change with the days, the setting never. We are in Bayreuth, in the home of a rich Christian family. Every day at 4 p.m., the mistress of the house (the filmmaker’s mother) receives her friends to exchange the most unrestrained confidences. These amusing ladies have no use for kid gloves: they judge, pass sentence, execute. The men are far away and they take full advantage of their brief minutes of freedom. Everything comes in for discussion: faith, principles, morals, cities for good shopping, the bad manners of the Malian boy servant, the impudence of the Sri Lankan maid, liftings and liposuctions. But, cosmopolitan, the Lebanon remains the most beautiful country in the world and nothing beats the perfection of the Lebanese wife. The men just do not appreciate their luck. Desperate Housewives in its Lebanese version. (Yann Lardeau)