The Man with One Red Shoe (1985)

(In French, On Cable TV, August 2021) It took me too long to realize it, but The Man with One Red Shoe is very much a remake of Le Grand Blond avec une chaussure noire, and for all of the good we may think of Tom Hanks in the lead role as a mild-mannered man thrust into spying intrigue through no fault of his own, he’s not quite Pierre Richard. Hanks is intensely likable, but he doesn’t have Richard’s manic goofiness nor his slapstick chops. Fortunately, the American version realizes that and dials back the physical comedy in favour of reaction shots whenever Hanks’ character finds himself in situations he’s ill-equipped to handle. The mid-1980s atmosphere is almost overpowering, taking place in a Washington, DC, demimonde of spies trying to one-up each other through the use of an unwitting stooge. Contrivances naturally run high in a film of that nature, with the void left by Richard’s performance felt most acutely in the film’s very mild humour. It’s not a terrible film, but it doesn’t quite reach the level of other Hanks comedies of the era. The period atmosphere of the film is getting better as time goes by, and young Hanks is always interesting to see the more you know about his later career. As a remake, The Man with One Red Shoe is disappointing—so don’t watch it too close to the original.