Quand vient l'automne

I was attracted by the short review "Falling without Judgment". As expected, the conspiracy and suspense were full, with mushroom poisoning at the beginning, falling from a building and funeral in the middle, and the grown-up grandson saying "I have always liked eating mushrooms"... I couldn't help but watch it again, looking forward to discovering more details. After reading it, I found that I was narrow-minded.

[Did the heroine place the poisonous mushrooms on purpose?]

Yes, I think the heroine did it on purpose, but I don't think her purpose was to poison her daughter. A more reasonable guess is to make her daughter uncomfortable and need to stay in bed for a few days. Her daughter is divorcing her husband, who is also abroad. In this way, her grandson and daughter can only stay with her.

Garlic butter baked mushrooms are obviously the daughter's favorite. The daughter asked for it even though she was not hungry. As for whether the heroine is sure that her grandson will not eat it, I think she is not sure. Because the grandson is a child who is very good at reading the atmosphere and taking care of the emotions of adults. When the heroine just came in and asked them to eat, the daughter said that they were not hungry after eating sandwiches, but the grandson immediately asked for it. When he ate later, the grandson ate very small mouthfuls. I guess he was really not hungry. After the meal, the heroine asked if he wanted dessert, and the grandson immediately said he wanted to eat it. It can be seen that even if the heroine made ingredients that the grandson hated, the grandson would eat it according to her expression.

Then why did the grandson say that he didn’t like mushrooms and garlic?

I guess he didn't want the heroine to cook specially, or to cook less, to work less, because he felt sorry for the heroine. Just like when we go home for Chinese New Year and see our mother busy making New Year dishes, such as fried meatballs and ribs, we would say that we don't like it anymore and don't want to make it. There were fewer mushrooms beside the stove than when they were cut. I think poisoning the mushrooms was a sudden inspiration, not the original plan. The heroine asked her best friend who knew mushrooms (obviously, her best friend was no longer able to walk well) to take her. After picking them, she compared them with the mushroom illustrations. She must have known that her daughter loved them and was afraid that she would get sick from eating them. When she was cutting mushrooms, she thought of the quarrel between her daughter and herself. She was afraid that her daughter would not stay with her grandson for long, and she wanted them to stay for a few more days. So she thought that her daughter would be fine if she was sick. But after all, it was poisoning, a sin. She cut them and put them in the bowl in a trance, but was worried that she could not control the amount, so she took some out in a trance.

[Is the best friend's son the murderer of my daughter?]

My personal inclination is that it was an accident. But it was the heroine who led the bestie's son to Paris to find the daughter, but no one wanted to kill the daughter. Although it was not portrayed in the movie, I think the daughter and the bestie's son used to have a very good relationship, childhood sweethearts. At the beginning of the meal, she also asked about the bestie and her son. She cared. The heroine and the bestie are colleagues and close friends, and they have a lot of intersections in their daily lives. The two children are in the same situation, and they must rely on each other in school. In Paris, the daughter opened the door for him to come in, and relaxed in front of him to smoke. It can be seen that the two had a deep bond. I don't know whether the daughter parted ways with the bestie's son because he was in jail or because he was gay.

From the conflict scene in the bar, we can see that the bestie's son is a very impulsive person. It is probably because of the way he learned to protect himself and his loved ones in his childhood: if he is offended, he will fight back immediately. And from the daily life of the bestie and him, the conversation between the two is more like an imperative, which makes the bestie's son's words not very pleasant. My personal guess is that on the balcony of the Paris apartment, the daughter was smoking on a small ladder, and the bestie's son chased her and forcefully asked her to understand and sympathize with the heroine to let her grandson go back, but the daughter refused more fiercely and even swore, so the bestie's son pushed her in response, and she fell from the building...

Regarding my best friend’s son being in jail, it was definitely a violent conflict, but judging by his slight limp, the situation must have been quite intense.

[Does the heroine love her daughter?]

100% Love

money

From the conversation between the female police officer and the policewoman, we can learn that: (1) the biological father of the daughter may be a pimp; (2) the female policewoman has a good business, has high-level clients, and has been in business for a long time, and only closed the business before her grandson was born.

From the Paris apartment to the big house in the countryside, and the funds she gave to her bestie's son to open a bar, the heroine is quite rich. But she dresses simply, takes care of her own garden and vegetable garden, and doesn't order expensive meals or desserts when she invites guests to dinner after being released from prison.

So why does it take so long to earn money?

To prepare for a worry-free life for myself and my daughter & to be good at sex work

My daughter hit a bottleneck in her theatre project and when she was discharged from the hospital after suffering poisoning, she said she would have to hold on until the end of the month for 500 euros. I guess the heroine contributed a lot.

Affection

After receiving a call from her son-in-law and learning that her daughter had fallen to her death, the heroine was alone in the garden and fell twice. There was no one around at this time, so she didn't need to act. When she went to the Paris apartment, she first went to her daughter's room, smelled her daughter's pajamas, and then went to her grandson's room.

Although the heroine loves her grandson very much and wants to live with him, I think she loves her daughter more. What the daughter hated was her mother's previous career, and the resulting school bullying and discrimination around her.

But the daughter also loves her mother. When she was discharged from the hospital after being poisoned, she directly accused her mother of poisoning her, but she didn't report it to the police in the end. The grandson said that his daughter didn't like nature or exercise, but the flowers and plants on the balcony of the Paris apartment were well taken care of. She disliked the ugly furniture of the Paris apartment, but she didn't sell the apartment immediately, even though her own theater project was short of funds. Looking back, the accusation of asking the heroine if she had gained weight during dinner also seemed like some kind of childish concern.

[Daughter “Spirit”]

The daughter died with her eyes open? It is more like the embodiment of the selfishness in the heroine's heart, and the expectation that the heroine dare not express. The daughter's "spiritual" face looks like the daughter, the heroine, and the grandson. This unfulfilled desire stimulates people's "thoughts". No matter how well-intentioned the "thoughts" are, they may cause irreversible consequences. If these consequences return, they will become one's "sin".

The heroine's long-term experience as a sex worker has caused her to neglect her daughter's growth. The bullying around her caused her daughter emotional trauma and alienated her from herself. Before her grandson was born, she was afraid that her grandson would follow her daughter's old path, so she decided not to do sex work again.

In order to be closer to his daughter and grandson, he could not tell whether he consciously or unconsciously planted poisonous mushrooms, which nearly killed his daughter, further alienating her from him and she never picked mushrooms again.

By hinting to her best friend's son to persuade her daughter, the daughter fell to her death unexpectedly, and her best friend's son may be imprisoned again. Death is irreversible, and it is useless to stop doing anything.

God does not judge anyone, but man can. One is like an open book in front of oneself. One can deceive oneself but cannot hide anything. In the end, one judges one's own "sin". How to save? Naturally, people come to save people

It's super cliché, sincerity for sincerity. (Sincerity can be exchanged for sincerity, but it doesn't necessarily mean sincerity) People are complex or messy.

I always thought that the heroine had helplessness but also some courage to fight against the secular world in that era when she chose sex workers. But in the bar fight scene, I really saw a helpless little old lady. When someone pointed at her and called her a blonde old bitch in the bar, her best friend's son stepped forward to fight back. She pulled him back with her withered hands, afraid of conflict, and acquiesced to the other party's insults in her heart. Other guests in the bar helped to separate the fight, and after the insulters were driven out of the bar, everyone continued to sing and dance. She was still in shock, even in her own territory. Whenever she met people, she had to wear a skirt with her hair tied up, even when picking mushrooms. She only wore jeans when she was working in her own vegetable garden. This is a very well-disciplined person, and she complies with the stereotyped requirements of the secular world for her gender. A society made up of individuals is more complex, but it is never monolithic. People are all made of flesh and blood and everyone will die. It is the same truth. It is not the development of the times and the progress of science and technology that make us more open and civilized, but more exchanges of knowledge that allow us to see, experience, understand and identify. Human universality is openness and civilization.

I believe that as the number of "Parisians" in the town where the heroine lives increases, many people have already known her and her bestie's original occupations, but most people choose to ignore it. When the heroine and her bestie returned from mushroom picking, they took the initiative to greet the residents who were hunting. When the drunk cursed at the bar dance, other guests ignored the drunkard, and when a conflict broke out, it was the guests who pulled the drunkard away. The drunkard's friends did not leave with him. At the funeral of the bestie, many residents came to see him off. Is love a kind of desire? Desire is like invisible hyphae buried deep in the soil. The nodes of hyphae grow in autumn and become mushrooms called love. If we find that the mushrooms are bad when we pick them, we will discard them immediately. But what about the guilty people? Will they be discarded too?

At the end, the grandson decided not to sell the house in Paris. The house that his daughter thought was "dirty" and ugly was completely accepted by the grandson, just like the guilty heroine. She smiled while riding in the car, and when she saw the "daughter's" spirit in the forest, she held her hand. She was finally accepted and she was innocent...

Every character in the movie is a heretic.

In the forest, no matter what color, shape, or whether the mushrooms are poisonous or not, as long as they are mushrooms, they can grow and multiply here.

The second time I watched the movie, I paid more attention to the audio-visual effects. The camera movement of the movie was very slow, which was in line with the rhythm of the movie. A lot of the dramatic plots were presented in a dedramatic way. It was really relaxing to watch it as a whole. The first time I watched it, I only vaguely felt the male protagonist's sexual orientation. This time, I noticed a lot of obvious lines and scenes to show the male protagonist's homosexuality, especially when it was dry... Of course, at the end, the little boy and the male protagonist also asked each other about their emotional state. After the screening, the director also said that there was a plot on the balcony when writing the script, but he chose not to present it. Visually, I still sighed at the presentation of the environment. It was so beautiful. Every empty shot was like an impressionist painting. Most of the shots used medium and close-ups, and only a few self-judgment shots used close-ups. The effect presented by the monosyllabic piano sound at the beginning was also very consistent with the beautiful countryside, and the string music in the second half was somewhat sad.

London Film Festival 25th. Ozon is as always, the moral dilemma and moral judgment are still very real, as if we would make the same choice if we were in it, such as whether we should be forgiven by society after the legal trial, the influence of the original family and the historical memory of the family. Although the male protagonist's crime in the past is not shown, it seems to be related to sexual minorities, and everything seems to indicate that he and she should be morally recognized. Putting aside the above, this movie is like a beautiful joke. We are not sure which will come first, the accident or the autumn. Maybe we need to cherish the present more. In terms of plot... so few characters... it is also amazing to tell such a complex story, and each character is very vivid. Visually, the presentation of natural scenery is so beautiful. I didn't pay much attention to the movement of the camera. It is really a waste of time to read subtitles in non-English films... I am deeply impressed by several slow zoom shots that highlight the inner state of the characters. There are quite a lot of panoramic views in the composition. The sound effect is very natural in hearing.

Director QA,

The actress mentioned that the reason for the role was her knowledge of the quality of Ozon's work, and that it was rare to give such an important role to an older woman, but even more surprising and rare was that the role was so strong, and despite her age, she was still full of love, curiosity and talent. This role has extraordinary complexity.

The director mentioned the design of this character. He thinks that in movies, especially in French movies, older women are often invisible. He wants to find real women - women who are willing to accept their age. It is difficult for women, especially actresses, to show their real age on the screen. But this time, he wanted to work with actors who are comfortable with their 80s, and people in their 70s still look young in the camera, they are still beautiful, just like in the past. So, he didn't want signs of plastic surgery, wrinkles can now show beauty on the screen. We are not used to seeing real expressions on the faces of actors, especially American actresses, and the same is true for French actresses. He also said... I hope there are no French actresses here (laughing). So, his idea is to show the life of a woman - she retires and spends her beautiful old age in the countryside, we follow her life and try to play with this contrast, the seemingly perfect grandmother, but they hide their past, have an unusual life, or have a special past. The beautiful and kind face of the heroine may hide a terrible past, and the pasts of these two women are very interesting.

Speaking of mushrooms, mushrooms are an autobiographical element because there was an incident involving mushrooms in his childhood. When he was a child, he had a great aunt who he loved very much. She once organized a family dinner. She picked some mushrooms in the forest near their home and cooked a meal. As a result, everyone got food poisoning and some family members were even hospitalized. Only the aunt herself was fine because she didn't eat the mushrooms she cooked. The director was still young at the time and was not invited. His parents still remember this incident because they were very sick and very angry with his aunt. But for the director, he had a fantasy when he was a child - that the aunt actually wanted to poison the whole family on purpose (laughing). This was a fantasy of his childhood.

Speaking of style, the host asked: This is a film with a lot of styles. It starts out as a calm family drama, but then gradually changes and it's hard to put it into any fixed genre. I know you mentioned Georges Simenon, but the atmosphere of the film is reminiscent of Claude Chabrol, a kind of thriller with a slow pace.

The director replied that it can be said to be a very slow thriller, but in fact I did not deliberately follow the framework of a certain type of film. One of my sources of inspiration is Georges Simenon, because he is good at depicting the atmosphere of a French town - calm on the surface, but turbulent in reality. Everything seems perfect, but there are often terrible secrets hidden behind it. I like this setting very much, especially when shooting in Burgundy, which is a place I often visited in my childhood. The film shows the beautiful natural scenery of this small town, but at the same time, the people hidden behind this peaceful scenery are not pure and flawless. They have their own secrets just like people anywhere in the world.

Answer about ghosts: I like ghosts in movies. In this movie, I was more inspired by another movie of mine, Under the Sand, where Charlotte Rampling's character lives with the ghost of her late husband. I have always explored the theme of death and mourning in my movies. In this movie, I wanted to show the communication barrier between mother and daughter. They could hardly talk to each other when they were alive, and they could not communicate at all. However, when the mother died, this kind of communication seemed to be possible to some extent, and even at the end of the movie, they seemed to have reached some kind of reconciliation. This often happens in real life, and people often really reconcile when facing death or ghosts. So, I wanted to express this through this movie.

Regarding the role of the daughter in the film, an audience member asked, "During the film, she kept thinking, do we all have the right to a "second chance"? This is actually a line in the film - in the mushroom eating scene, the mother said to her daughter: "Everyone should have a second chance." But at the beginning of the film, the image of the daughter is actually difficult for the audience to resonate with, and it is even easy to make people disgusted. So how did you give this character a "second chance" during the film's progress?

The director replied: As the audience gradually understands the heroine's past, they will understand the daughter's reaction and her hostility towards her mother. This character is indeed not easy to like, but I tried to make her behavior logic seem real and credible. I have a very good friend who is a psychoanalyst and he once told me: "The most neurotic relationship in human beings is always the mother-daughter relationship." Of course, he is a man, so he said that. For me, I know that the role of the daughter is not likable. And I haven't worked with Ludivine Sagnier for 20 years. When I handed her this role, she said to me: "Thank you for giving me the opportunity to come back." But I think she is very good at portraying this role. And the moment she cries when she leaves her mother's house, you realize that she is actually unhappy with this relationship. She is not only angry at her mother, but also angry at herself. She is actually in pain.

Regarding the case of the daughter on the balcony, what exactly happened and whether the heroine was involved. The director replied: When I wrote the script, of course I knew very well what happened, especially the scene on the balcony. I knew the real situation at that time. But I decided not to present this scene. I think this way of handling it allows the audience to stand in the perspective of the heroine. She was not at the scene at the time, so she didn't know what happened. In fact, she didn't even want to know the truth, she would rather choose to turn a blind eye. Therefore, the truth of this scene depends on the audience's own interpretation-is the heroine guilty? Does she know the truth? Huppert said something to me after watching the movie, which I think summarizes the core of the movie very accurately. She said: "This is a movie about the subconscious." I also agree that this movie is actually exploring the heroine's subconscious.

"A father conceals his son's secrets, and a son conceals his father's secrets; this is the truth."

This quote comes from the Analects of Confucius, Zilu. The context is about a nobleman telling Confucius that there is an upright person among them. To what extent is he upright? "His father stole sheep, and his son testified for him."

Confucius then replied that the integrity in our place is not the same as yours. In our place, integrity can be demonstrated by protecting one's relatives.

The film's opening statement sets the context: "The New Testament, Luke, The Sinful Woman Was Forgiven." The priest who recites the sutra is arranged to edit the original sutra. If the omitted parts are completed, it may be helpful to understand the plot:

Jesus said, “A creditor had two debtors: one owed him fifty denarii and the other fifty denarii. Since they could not pay, the creditor forgave both of them. Which of the two will love him more?” Simon answered, “I suppose the one to whom he was forgiven more.” Jesus said to him, “You have judged well.”… “You did not kiss me, but this woman has been kissing my feet since I came in;”… “(Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much.) But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little.”

This passage is actually quite interesting, especially when we notice that the main character Michelle's daughter makes an excuse to avoid the kiss when they meet.

This daughter who was chosen by the plot to bear the misfortune, obviously, behaved in the opposite way to what the gospel advocated:

"Do not judge" in the Gospel of Luke: "Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven. ... Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the beam that is in your own eye? ...'"

When she talked to Michelle, she tried hard to convict Vincent. When she talked to Vincent, she regarded Michelle as a thorn in her side. Not only did she conclude that the poisonous mushrooms were related to a conspiracy, but even her ghost came to the hard-won family happiness to identify the perpetrator. However, Michelle's conversation with her son-in-law Laurent at the scene of her daughter's suspected suicide was like this:

Laurent: "We love each other, but our love is terrible. I hate myself." Michelle replied: "I can't blame you." Laurent: "We shouldn't get divorced." Michelle replied: "It's the same whether we get divorced or not."

So Michelle, a former special worker and a "guilty woman" in the eyes of the world, plays the role of the opposite character. Her words and deeds can reveal the right path. For example, she finally got to spend time with her grandson Lucas as her wish came true, but she calmly said to her former son-in-law who repeatedly asked Lucas to follow him to live in Dubai: Don't worry, he will go.

The core of the plot is whether the daughter's fall to death was an accident, or was caused by Vincent who went to visit her out of justice and the impulse to awaken his conscience. Due to the foreshadowing of the poisonous mushroom incident, there should be no suspense in the hearts of Michelle and even Lucas. So many years later, when Lucas returned to France from his father to attend university and was able to return to Michelle's country table for dinner, his habit of not liking to eat mushrooms since childhood had been completely tampered with by the bright memories without any grudges and turned into a warm nostalgia for his love of eating mushrooms. In short, the Confucian idea of ​​protecting one's relatives should not conform to the basic setting of this moral story. On the contrary, Vincent's mother, Michelle's best friend, suspected her son of killing someone on impulse, and then suspected that her son's crime was instigated by her best friend. She revealed all kinds of uneasiness due to her inner torture, and finally gave up the burden of protecting her son alone before she died after accepting her best friend's sincerity. In sharp contrast to her torment, Michelle, Lucas and Vincent are calm and frank without any need to defend themselves even when facing the pursuit of outsiders. They might say that in their place, worldly ambiguity does not hinder the rule of love and trust over the heart, and in their place, such a principle is blessed by the shadow, so this is purely a moral story "from our place".

Regarding the title of the film, allow me to give another product of divergent thinking - has Ozon read Rilke's "Autumn"?

Lord, it is time. …

...Whoever has no house now will not build one,

Whoever is lonely now will be lonely forever.

Will be awake, reading, writing long letters,

I will walk inadvertently on the forest path

Walking, worrying, when the leaves fall.

I don't understand Rilke's German, so I found a translation in Ozon's native language on the Internet. The above sentences translated from this are similar to the translations of Feng Zhi and others. The minor differences are a way of trying to stick to the "original meaning". The "now" set in the poem is the end of summer and the coming of autumn. The tense is mostly in the future tense, and Chinese has to use adverbs such as "just" and "will" to convey this dynamic. The key point is the ending "When the leaves fall Quand tomberont les feuilles". The original text uses subject-predicate inversion. If it is taken out alone, it is like a question sentence. This is the same as the title of this film Quand vient l'automne (which can explain why the English translation is exactly When the fall is coming). The only difference is the tense. The fallen leaves in Rilke's poem will fall in autumn, while the camera has already entered the autumn as grand as summer, and the protagonist Michelle is enjoying it with the standard posture of fallen leaves returning to their roots.

By the way, I really like to see those directors who used to have sharp perspectives and strong styles gradually smooth out their edges and lose their edge, just like taking off a gorgeous and outstanding coat and putting on delicate and comfortable underwear, becoming more skin-friendly (the distance from the audience), and expressing more thoughts and understandings about life and human nature through careful observation and unique ideas with a light yet profound attitude.

Ozon, who used to be "bold and reckless" and often caused a lot of controversy, is almost 60 years old. This latest work, "When Will Autumn Come", has a calm and poetic feeling just by listening to the title. This time, the focus is on the twilight years, mixed with sadness and joy, and dust to dust, and dust to dust. It still has the familiar flavor of the past, but at the same time, we can also see his changes in imaging techniques and explorations.

This film actually tells a very simple story, but Ozon's reluctance to reveal the story provides more room for thinking and analysis. Like Haneke's Hidden Camera, Ozon plays the role of a questioner, leading and deepening the audience's participation step by step.

Did the mother poison her daughter intentionally? Or was it an unintentional mistake? Was her daughter's death caused by Vincent? Or was it suicide? The truth is not absolute. As the plot progresses, the audience is always in an ambiguous gray area under the suspenseful atmosphere created by "deliberate concealment".

The death of the daughter and the policewoman's questions instantly reminded me of "The Fallen Judgement", which also threw out an unresolved mystery, but the differences in motives, identities and situations weakened the necessity and guilt of the trial. The consistent responses from the grandmother and grandson made the intention of covering up more clear.

Obviously, neither of them could bear to lose the hard-earned companionship and warmth. It makes people wonder whether the boundaries between crime and punishment, good and evil must be clearly divided. Through the ingenious drama conception, the complexity of human nature is far beyond imagination, and can even be analyzed from different levels.

First of all, the poisonous mushroom incident can be understood as an unintentional act by Michelle, but the grudge and estrangement between mother and daughter gave Michelle a motive to commit a crime. Even if it was intentional, her original intention might not be as extreme as wanting to poison her daughter, but just wanting to use a little trick to satisfy her own selfish desires.

Another interesting point is the degree of his grandson's love for mushrooms. The scale will naturally lean towards which side one looks at the problem from. Misunderstanding or disguise is a matter of opinion. But to convict or exonerate Michel based on absolute good and evil always seems to underestimate Ozon's intentions.

Then there is the death of the daughter. Perhaps Vincent, the son of a good friend, did something bad with good intentions. Murder is a crime, but is it unforgivable? It inevitably arouses some sympathy, which is particularly subtle. And the emotional performance of the daughter cannot rule out the possibility of suicide. Watching this film always reminds me of "Autumn Sonata" which I watched not long ago.

They are both mother and daughter, but they have a blood relationship of love and hate, a gap in their hearts that cannot be crossed, and hopeless hurt in communication. They are ties that can never be cut or abandoned, but one is admiration, and the other is contempt. After the daughter died in the film, she appeared in front of Michelle in the form of a soul many times. Was it a debt or guilt? It was not until her death that she let go and put an end to the story.

Through identity setting, Ozon broke the habitual prejudices of many people. Michelle, a former prostitute, and Vincent, who had been in prison, were "beautified" to a large extent, eliminating the misunderstandings and preconceived impressions about them. The accusations and insults in the film instead aroused empathy outside the screen.

What's interesting is that Ozon cut out a lot of details, and didn't elaborate on the dark history of Michel and Vincent. What we see is more of a beautiful and lonely old woman's desire and love for her grandson; a seemingly rough and dangerous man's careful insight and help. It can be seen that many times we can't easily and one-sidedly measure or define a person only by the standard of good or bad.

After watching this movie, I was filled with thoughts and a sense of peace that everything will eventually pass away. Each character is very vivid, and some close-up shots make some intentions and speculations meaningful. I can't forget the smile of my grown-up grandson in the car. Simply think about this movie, which is actually a story about several people on the edge comforting each other and keeping each other warm.

I really like the scenery of the French countryside, the changing of the four seasons, aging and illness are the natural laws that no one can resist or avoid. Eventually, my best friend passed away due to illness, and Michelle died in the forest she loved most. As she was approaching old age, she wondered when autumn would come. The bleakness under the warm sun was filled with a charming bitterness and beautiful sadness, and the mixed feelings of impermanence were hard to describe.

François Ozon's new work "When Will Autumn Come" in 2024 is set against the backdrop of an autumn landscape in the Burgundy countryside. It combines suspense and family ethics, and showcases the director's signature delicate narrative and insight into human nature. Through a sudden mushroom poisoning incident, the film reveals the trauma and lies that have entangled three generations for half a century, and finally questions the nature of the truth in an open ending. The story revolves around Michelle, an elderly woman living alone, who uses gardening and mushroom picking to relieve her loneliness, but her daughter Valerie is poisoned by the carefully prepared mushroom feast. This accident became the fuse of family conflict-Valerie had long been resentful of her mother's sex work when she was young, and the relationship between mother and daughter was on thin ice. When Vincent, the son of a bestie, tried to mediate the relationship between mother and daughter but accidentally caused Valerie to fall to her death, the truth became even more confusing. The film did not rush to reveal the cause of death, but hinted at the ambiguity of the truth through details such as the silent shots of the funeral and Michelle's false testimony for Vincent. Ozon captures the richness and bleakness of autumn with a painting-like lens language: country paths in golden fallen leaves, vineyards shrouded in morning mist, and stained glass in a quiet church, forming a strong contrast between the beauty of nature and the inner turmoil of the characters. Mushrooms, as a metaphor throughout the film, not only symbolize the potential crisis of pastoral life, but also allude to the complex taste of family memories - just as the old people lamented that "a basket of mushrooms is always poisonous", some pains are destined to be unspeakable. The restrained use of the soundtrack further strengthens the suspenseful atmosphere. The piano melody hides uneasiness under the calm appearance, forming a shocking contrast with the silent long shot when Valerie fell from the building. Helen Vincent interprets Michelle's loneliness and tenacity with her delicate performance. From the joy of picking mushrooms to the trembling at the funeral, she vividly shows the love and guilt of a mother. The blank treatment of the scene where Valerie falls from the building is a stroke of genius. It not only retains the possibility of criminal suspense, but also allows the audience to focus on how the survivors face trauma - the grandson Lucas finally chooses to live with his grandmother, suggesting that the scarred family still has the possibility of reconciliation. The film continues Ozon's profound exploration of family ethics, but escapes the black-and-white moral judgment. When the police asked the truth, Michel chose to protect Vincent, which was both to redeem others and to heal himself. This "no-questioning-for-answers" approach echoes the image of the coming of autumn in Burgundy at the end of the film - life will continue, and some secrets may never need to be revealed. "When Will Autumn Come" has become one of Ozon's most humanistic works in recent years with its poetic images and restrained narrative, and it is worth the audience to savor it quietly when the autumn is getting thicker.