‘The richest woman in the world’: Huppert holds her own in a film about the L’Oréal scandal

The richest woman in the world is like one of those board games that revolve around money, power, and family, where even the butler is an important piece. At the heart of it all is the real scandal of Liliane Bettencourt, heiress of the L’Oréal group, who passed away at 94 in 2017 after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Netflix dedicated a documentary series (The Bettencourt Affair) to the scandal surrounding her final years when in 2010 her daughter, Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, aired her mother’s life in a legal process seeking her incapacitation under the pretext that she was being extorted.

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At the center of the controversy was François-Marie Banier, a friend of Liliane. Photographer, bon vivant, and homosexual novelist, he became close to the matriarch. He spent time with her circle in the Bettencourt family mansions and received donations from her amounting to a billion euros. The entire investigation was based on hidden recordings that revealed both Banier’s bad manners and those of the mother’s entourage.

With all this material, Thierry Klifa sets in motion a game that fails to maintain tension, stretching beyond two hours, in which the queen of the board, actress Isabelle Huppert, stands out above all. As is her custom, Huppert is able to navigate the murky waters of a difficult character not only because it is inspired by reality, but because it is the portrait of a woman at the top whose rigidity mixes with extreme moods, loneliness, and a complex pathos to sustain. The rest of the cast manages to hold their own, which is no small feat, although the unbearable character of Banier (played by Laurent Lafitte) is excessive and the mother-daughter duel (played by Marina Foïs) remains superficial.

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The richest woman in the world could work as the portrait of a woman in her golden cage with phrases for the gallery like this: “The word rich is not pretty. I prefer the word fortune. Fortune depends on luck, wealth is inherited.” Or this one: “Beyond a certain amount, people go off the rails. It takes talent to be rich.” The result, however, fails to go beyond the appeal of its lead actress.

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