MISERICORDE (MISERICORDIA) (France 2024) **** Directed by Alain Giuraudie
Returning to Saint-Martial for his late boss's funeral, Jérémie's stay with widow Martine becomes entangled in a disappearance, a threatening neighbor, and an abbot's shady intentions.
MISERICORDE has the feel of a Claude Chabrol murder film in which the cat-and-mouse tale is mainly the mouse outwitting the cat with the aid of his cohorts.The film is a prized twisted macabre tale with bouts of unexpected humour from the director of the 2014 gay hit L’CONNU DU LAC (Stranger by the Lake), this one with the fabulous Catherine Frot as a widow. who takes in Jérémie (Félix Kysyl) as a lodger whose sensual presence is immediately and progressively destabilizing to everyone around him.Martine (Catherine Frot) happens to be the mother of his childhood friend, the brutish Vincent (Jean-Baptiste Durand).
Catherine Frot is always a pleasure to watch, she being one of my personal favourite French actresses. Newcomer Félix Kysyl is also marvellous as the quietly sexy troublemaker, who has fate both work against and for him, depending on how one looks at it. The twists of fate and unexpected bouts of humour are what make director Giuraudie's film so entertaining. MISERICORDIAmeans Mercy in English.
The film demonstrates that actual fake rain need not be used in a scene that involves it. One scene has the sound of heavy rain, followed by a scene with Jeremie drenched from head to foot. But there is no rain seen in the background. Yet, the scene is credible enough for the audience to believe that it rained.
Subtlety in the script also provides additional pleasure in the film. "We are all entitled to a private life," says the priest at one point in the film, his homosexuality hidden and never practiced till then.
The duo’s interactions are terse and laden with resentment but clearly erotically charged.When a fight goes awry, Misericordia swerves into noir territory with absurdist undertones, and an ensuing investigation spirals around a loner neighbour, ineffectual gendarmes, and a nosy country priest — seemingly the only inhabitants in this dewy, mountainous village perpetually bathed in twilight.No sex scenes but there are two with full penises on display, that are both erotic and hilarious.MISEROCORDE, extremely well plotted and executed, is a total wicked delight!
Nothing in the movie is what it seems.What appears to be an animal scouring around his car turns out to be an older woman.Her supposed injury turns out to be something else.
And nothing is what Romain (Milton Riche) has expected.He never expected to drop his lit cigarette in the car and to shop by the roadside as a resultIf not the woman would not have entered his vehicle. The question also arises whether the audience is put in Romain’s shoes, as he is high as a kite, after experimenting with a new drug at his dealer’s.
Eighteen-year-old Romain has just graduated and makes a stop at his dealer’s place to try a new pill. He, of course, has snorted a few lines of coke as well.As he heads off to a party with his girlfriend waiting for him there, hoping to score more drugs, he sees an injured woman on the side of the road and decides to help her, but when she gets in his car, she suddenly smashes her own head against the dashboard, bleeding out until she dies.So is this a hallucination bad trip? Or is it something else?One thing is for sure to the audience, it’s only the beginning of the wild night where anything else can happen and probably will.
The film MADS is advertised as a thriller/mystery/horror and works equally well in either of these genres.
Director Moreau ups the ante with strobing lights and weird noises on the soundtrack to let his audience feel the intensity and uneasiness that Romain feels.It is not helped when his girlfriend Ana shows up and keeps asking him if anything is wrong, and whether it is her.Things get worse when her friends show up, all intending to have a wild night partying.While all this is happening, a voiceover goes: “Subject C39 achieved!Contamination!”
Spoiler alert (this paragraph only:)For what is lacking in the story - the film has a loose narrative based on the single premise of the end of the world scenario, which it makes up in interspersed scary scenes like the women suddenly appearing all bloodied in Romain’s bathtub or Romain suddenly violently beating up a girl at a party.Some suspense is also generated with his father, away on business constantly calling Romain asking if everything is all right when obviously, everything is not.The dad calls Romain at one instant when the alarm in his house goes off, and Romain has to check on what is going on, cycling frantically home to turn off the alarm system.All the while, he is high on drugs and not wanting the police to show up, though he clearly needs help.MADS plays like a madcap horror film, which is an intensive watch, making it a standout horror film because the end-of-world scenario has never been done beef this way.
MADS has premiered at several film festivals internationally and opens for streaming on the streaming horror service, Shudder on October 18th.This one is worth a look.
CineFranco, a celebration of French Cinema, one of my favourite Film Festival returns to Toronto November the 1st with a wide range off French films from over the world, including the latest film QUAND VIENT L’AUTOMNE from Francois Ozone currently playing in Paris. Under the leadership and auspices of its directrice Marcelle Lean, this year’s films will be screened right in the heart of downtown Toronto any the Carton Cinemas.
Please check the Cinefranco website at cirefarnco.com for the entire program and screening times.
BonCinema!
Capsule Review of Select Films:
ET LA FETE CONTINUE! (And the {party Goes On!) (France 2023) ***½
Directed by Robert Guédiguian
Robert Guédiguian veteran of cinema, a majority of them set in his birthplace of Marseille, returns with his wife and muse Ariane Ascaride starring in AND THE PARTY GOES ON, a melancholic, reflection of times past full of nostalgia and good intentions. The film is full of repeatable quotations and every character in the story has a good heart in Marseille, France. Rosa (Ascaride) divides her energy between her close-knit family, her nursing work and her political commitment. But as she approaches retirement, her illusions begin to waver. When meeting Henri (Jean-Pierre Darroussin), she realizes that it's never too late to achieve her own dreams, both political and personal. Robsinso Stevenin also has a role-playing Rosa’s Armenian son, Sarkis. The film also contains beautiful shots of Marielle and the surrounding sea. Fans of Robert Guédiguian should be delighted. Quite a few of Guédiguian’s film, except this one, have been picked up by TIFF and it is good that CineFranco can get this title.
Trailer:
CHASSE GARDEE (Guest Place)(France 2023) *** Directed by Frédéric Forestier and Antonin Fourlon
The comedy centres on a war between a Parisian family and the country folk. When a couple with two kids buys a house in the country to escape the pitfalls of city life to buy and settle in the country, they get more than they bargained for when hunting season begins and the hunters use their farmland as their hunting grounds.The family fear for their safety and wage a war with the whole village, comprising many of hunters.The film has a few keen observations of the country folk with a few good ideas like the very young mayor (because they cannot find anyone else to hold office) who is so young that he is still taking driving lessons and living with his mother and the switch in prices at the daily farmers market for city and country folk.But most of the jokes could have been funnier. But they do get funnier during the film's last quarter, which turns out to be quite endearing. Still, one can learn a few things from the film, like the French country cuisine of ceps (I had to look this up on Google), which enhances the film’s interest.The best thing about the movie is the cameo by Thierry Lermitte, who steals the show as the hilarious lawyer father of the wife.
THE OTHER LAURENS (Belgium/France 2023) *** Directed by Carl Schmitz
THE OTHER LAURENS implies that there are two of them.In fact, there are and they are twins.When one apparently is done away with, the other investigates the brother’s death with skeletons coming unhidden from the closet.The film plays like a neo-detective misery and it feels like the Raymond Chandler films.The only difference is that this film is from Belgium, with locations in the United States (the Grand Canyon) and that there is more family relationship drama in this neo-black thriller.
Gabriel Laurens (Olivier Rabourdin) is a shaggy dog private investigator seeking out an existence one seedy adultery case at a time.When his niece, Jade (Louise Leroy), shows up at his doorstep to notify him of his estranged twin brother François’ recent death, he decides to take a hiatus and drive her back to her father’s massive estate on the Franco-Spanish border.
The family drama slowly overrides the detective mystery, in both a good and bad way.One is that the mystery and action become secondary and secondly, director Schmitz eventually bungles with both, the result being a really slow and plodding second half stretching the film too long.The film does not know when it should end.
Upon their arrival, they’re met with a cold reception from Jade’s calculating stepmother, Shelby (Kate Moran), and her gang of crusty back-country bikers intent on tracking the young girl’s every move. Short on cash, Gabriel vows to stick around just long enough to get things smoothed over with his bank. The more he sees, however, the more he realizes things aren’t as cut and dry as they seem.
To unearth the true cause of his brother’s death, Gabriel dons the identity of "the other Laurens" and is slowly drawn into François’ shady underworld. Along the way, he’ll cross paths with a bizarro cast of characters, including a pair of bumbling cops, an American mercenary, and a ruthless family of drug traffickers.
At this point, director Schmitz slips into a bit of comedy especially when the American mercenary shows up.The film gets a bit weirder as the plot thickens a bit too much.The humour might be too droll for one’s liking.
THE OTHER LAURENS attempts, to director Schmitz’s credit to be a modern homage to the sun-drenched California noirs of the 1970s, injecting their laid-back, cynical vibe with a healthy dose of stylish European minimalism. This tactic works lifting the film out of the doldrums.
Among the awards, Awards:The film won the Grand Prix at the Brussels International Film Festival 2023 and the Best Actor Prize for Olivier Rabourdin) in the main role (yes, he is the best thing in the film) at the Brussels International Film Festival 2023.
THE OTHER LAR+UENS is filmed in French and some English with a little Italian and Spanish spoken for good measure.
The film had its premiere at the Directors Fortnight Section In Cannes last year and opens this week in theatres this week and on VOD on August 27th.
MISERICORDE (MISERICORDIA) (France 2024) **** Directed by Alain Giuraudie
Returning to Saint-Martial for his late boss's funeral, Jérémie's stay with widow Martine becomes entangled in a...
