Movie Review

  • Astérix chez les Bretons [Asterix in Britain] (1986)

    Astérix chez les Bretons [Asterix in Britain] (1986)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, December 2020) While not quite as much of a classic as the two 1960s animated Asterix films, Astérix chez les Bretons remains a pretty good adaptation of one of the best-known albums in the comic-book series. Obviously, stereotypes abound – and are even the film’s reason for existing as the Gauls go take a trip in England and discover two thousand years’ worth of jokes about bad food, tea, wretched syntax and rugby. (Black and Asian racism isn’t so much fun, though.) The animation is good by the standards of the 1980s, and allows the film to stick very, very close to Uderzo’s designs (which is a big deal compared to the live-action adaptations). Proudly watched in French; I can’t even imagine the mush that any translation would do to the language-related jokes. Solid film, a bit rough around the edges nowadays but still enjoyable.

  • Le règne de la beauté [An Eye for Beauty] (2014)

    Le règne de la beauté [An Eye for Beauty] (2014)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, December 2020) Writer-director Denys Arcand may be the reigning king of French-Canadian Oscar-winning movie directors (although Denis Villeneuve will get his someday), but not every single one of his films is equally important, and Le règne de la beauté ranks among the most trivial of them. Largely a story about a dull affair (woo, originality), it loses itself in pointless comments about beauty and architecture, even if the visual aspect of the film (which often takes place in Charlevoix’s natural landscapes) is a clear upgrade over Arcand’s previous work. The decent actors can’t do much with the material they’re given, because there’s simply not a whole lot there. The theme is tiresome, the treatment is pretentious and while I’m generally supportive of seeing more polished depictions of sex and nudity on-screen, it’s really not enough to make me any more sympathetic to the film in general. Sure, it’s watchable – but try to remember any specific details a few weeks later and we’ll talk.

  • The Deep (1977)

    The Deep (1977)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, December 2020) The production history of The Deep is almost more interesting than the film itself: Hot from the massive success of Jaws, author Peter Benchley’s next novel was quickly snapped up by Hollywood and turned into a summer tentpole film. Underwater filming in the newest widescreen colour format required new cameras and lighting systems, and much of the film was shot using the real actors (albeit in underwater sets requiring no deep dive). The result was… well, an acceptable thriller. The contrivances are significant (requiring criminals to take an interest in recovered WW2 morphine and one wreck lying atop another much older wreck with Spanish treasure) but the film is generally well executed. Setting counts for a lot in even run-of-the-mill thrillers, and underwater diving was a bit of a novelty at the time (although reprised a few times since then). Nick Nolte is pretty good as one of the co-leads, but Jacqueline Bisset steals the show with an opening sequence in a wet white T-shirt (an image so famous that there’s a very, very complete blog post about it). It all combines into a capable underwater thriller, perhaps not as remarkable now as it was back then, but still an entertaining-enough 1970s blockbuster film with some very good cinematography.

  • Morning Glory (2010)

    Morning Glory (2010)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, December 2020) Harrison Ford’s grumpiness is legendary enough, and it was about high time that it got a leading role. While Rachel McAdams has the leading role in Morning Glory as a news producer sent to rescue a failing morning show with warring co-anchors, it’s Ford’s magnificent crankiness that elevates the material to its cruising altitude. Bits and pieces from Patrick Wilson (as the love interest), Diane Keaton and Jeff Goldblum round off the acting highlights, but the film is perhaps at its comfiest when it dives into the mechanics of producing a morning variety show, then starts imagining nightmare scenarios when a reluctant hard-news journalist is forced to fit in that mould. Morning Glory is absolutely not supposed to be a film criticizing the media – it uses basic style-versus-substance conflict to flesh out the conventional romantic comedy material between the protagonist and her new boyfriend, with her friendship with the older newsman being the more interesting narrative strand. It’s basic crowd-pleasing mainstream filmmaking, amiable and charming, not interested in being offensive or provocative. As such, it works pretty well: the actors are all having fun, the romance ends in a good spot, Ford’s taciturn nature is channelled productively and if Morning Glory fails to be particularly memorable, at least it’s pleasant enough to watch.

  • Naked Lunch (1991)

    Naked Lunch (1991)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Youtube Streaming, December 2020) I won’t even try to explain the plot of Naked Lunch: it’s bizarre enough that it probably wouldn’t make sense anyway. But this reinterpretation of William S. Burroughs’ novel is one that relies more on scenes and visuals than overall plot for impact. What we do have here is an exterminator possibly driven to hallucinations through the bug powder dust he inhales. Or perhaps he’s a secret agent taking orders from insect-like creatures. Or maybe he’s a writer in North Africa, living in a science-fiction Interzone in-between aliens and secret operatives. Maybe he’s bisexual, or maybe insectsexual. Maybe he’s being directed by a harsh dark-haired woman, or maybe she’s just a man in elaborate disguise. Maybe he meets his dead wife’s doppelganger (albeit with a better and curlier haircut), or maybe she’s the same person. Maybe… yeah, maybe. A good cast (Peter Weller, Judy Davis, Ian Holm, Roy Scheider and, wait, is that Monique Mercure?) anchors the film in dubiously tactile reality, but don’t take anything for granted. After all, this is a film in which the protagonist’s typewriter gets an erection during a sex scene and if that doesn’t get you interested, then you were never meant to see it anyway. Under David Cronenberg’s typical direction, Naked Lunch is wonderfully weird even thirty years later – delightfully close to Science Fiction while also being recognizable as a psychological thriller if you choose to be a stick in the mud about the film’s genre affiliations. I’m glad I tried to watch the film and bounced off of it in the late 1990s – I had a much better time revisiting it now that my expectations were lowered and calibrated for maximum eccentricity. But I will admit that it’s not to everyone’s taste. Incidentally, the film inspired its perfect soundtrack three years later: Bomb the Bass’s Bug Powder Dust.

  • Awake (2007)

    Awake (2007)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Youtube Streaming, December 2020) The hook to Awake is as terrifying as it is simple: What if, during open-heart surgery, you remained awake and heard… the doctor plotting to kill you? Of course, getting to that point requires a few specific circumstances that the film is happy to set up: Young billionaire, hot girlfriend, heart-surgeon friend and domineering mother – all the ingredients for a wild thriller. To its credit, Awake understands that it’s completely preposterous, and goes even further into the madness: not content with having the character awake during his own open-heart surgery, it goes for astral projection and lets him roam the corridors of the hospital during the surgery, free to collect the clues that will explain what’s going on. Then things get kicked up another melodramatic notch, as some people realize what is going on and try to save the billionaire from a murderously conceived operation. Awake ends far closer to fantasy than to medical thriller, but it’s not a terrible ride after all. Sure, there are plenty of plot contrivances and slack moments and some annoying mid-2000s directorial tricks. But it keeps viewers’ attention throughout, and can benefit from an interesting cast, whether it’s Hayden Christensen as a billionaire, Jessica Alba as his new wife, Lena Olin as a mother more complicated than at first glance, or Terrence Howard as a heart surgeon. Awake is not that good of a movie — but it’s fun, and I’ve seen far worse mediocre ones.

  • Il était une fois les Boys [When We Were Boys] (2013)

    Il était une fois les Boys [When We Were Boys] (2013)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, December 2020) When you’ve squeezed the lemon dry on a franchise with four instalments, when the actors are becoming noticeably older than the roles they should be playing, when you’re already banking on a specific demographic, when there’s producer pressure to keep churning them out no matter what, there’s really only one solution: A prequel! After a fifteen-year run of four movies and a five-season TV series following the episodic adventures of middle-aged French-Canadian hockey fans who still play to the best of their abilities, the Les Boys franchise couldn’t really go anywhere else: by flashing back to 1967 in Il était une fois les Boys, it gets to tell an origin story and revel in the baby boomers’ near-mythical Year of Our Centenary, while keeping some of the characterization and flashing forward loudly enough to make viewers rewatch the other instalments. It works, but on a rote level: Sure, it’s nostalgic and likable, but there’s also a sense that it’s not really earning audience sympathy as much as it’s purchasing it by cultural callbacks, a tragic act break (this instalment is markedly more dramatic than the other, especially toward the end), and pointing back to the other instalments of the franchise. It’s clever in that way, I suppose: the French-Canadian film market is small, and any way to goose up box-office receipts can be fair game. At least Il était une fois les Boys seems to have been the capstone to the franchise: Seven years later, it’s still the latest word in the series.

  • Les Pee-Wee 3D: L’hiver qui a changé ma vie [The Pee-Wee 3D: The Winter That Changed My Life] (2012)

    Les Pee-Wee 3D: L’hiver qui a changé ma vie [The Pee-Wee 3D: The Winter That Changed My Life] (2012)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, December 2020) Exactly no one was asking for a teen hockey film in three dimensions, but I suppose that the marketing coup in the small French-Canadian market was worth it – and let’s face it, audiences here lap up any kind of hockey film. Les Pee-Wee 3D: L’hiver qui a changé ma vie is familiar material – three young teenagers are brought together by hockey, learning life lessons along the way and competing in a major tournament as a test of their skills. Two boys and one girl share lead roles, and director Eric Tessier effectively moves the pieces of this small-scale sports film. The drama is shot cleanly, the hockey sequences are pretty good, and everything in between is unobtrusive. People who aren’t from Canada (and even more so French-Canada) can’t quite understand the enormous infrastructure that makes the country such an effective hockey-player factory, and it starts at the very junior level. If nothing else, Les Pee-Wee is a glimpse into that subculture, a pleasant-enough sports film for teenagers, and an easy crowd-pleaser. Surprisingly enough, the film got a sequel five years later, Junior Majeur, which followed the main characters into their early adult years, with far darker and more complicated subplots.

  • Ah-ga-ssi [The Handmaiden] (2016)

    Ah-ga-ssi [The Handmaiden] (2016)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Kanopy Streaming, December 2020) Whenever there’s a new film by Chan-wook Park, the only good approach is to settle back in your seat and just accept what’s going to happen. You won’t be able to predict what happens. You won’t be prepared for the gorgeous set design. You won’t know on which tone the scenes are going to dance. You won’t know anything, so just enjoy. The Handmaiden is another illustration of this – a crime thriller that’s in part horrifying, suspenseful, erotic, angry, provocative, surprising, astonishing, awe-inspiring and darkly comic. It’s a blend of western inspiration and eastern execution (the premise is inspired by a novel from Welsh novelist Sarah Walters, but the setting and execution are thoroughly Korean) and it’s so thoroughly queer that it becomes inclusive. The Handmaiden isn’t for everyone, but it’s a wild ride for those who can brave its daredevil approach.

  • Parental Guidance (2012)

    Parental Guidance (2012)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, December 2020) While Billy Crystal isn’t listed as one of Parental Guidance’s screenwriters (although he is a producer), his brand of amiable old-school humour gets a pretty good fit in this story of generational clashes. The laughs begin when a couple has to go away for business and calls their parents to babysit the kids for a few days. Predictably, the old-school parenting represented by Crystal (and co-star Bette Midler) doesn’t quite fit the caricatural newageish instructions left by the parents… and things go on from there. It’s all meant to be sweet and easy to watch, which means that you will see every subplot coming from a mile away. As expected, Crystal plays into cranky baby-boomer stereotypes whose blunter methods of parenting can fill the gaps left by the too-permissive parents, and the ending sees personal growth for everyone involved. Unobtrusively directed by Andy Fickman (which apparently means letting Crystal do whatever he wants), the screenwriting tricks are obvious, the comedy is played broadly and the stereotypes take the place of characterization. And yet, it’s not unwatchable. Marisa Tomei is always a plus, and even the predictable sappiness works in wrapping up the film satisfyingly. Sure, Parental Guidance is Hollywood in autopilot mode, but when the formula works for most audiences, it works.

  • Rare Exports (2010)

    Rare Exports (2010)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, December 2020) The idea of a horror film in which Santa isn’t a kindly friend to all isn’t exactly original these days, but it’s given an energetic spin in Finnish writer-director Jalmari Helander’s Rare Exports. The Santa mythology is taken for a spin when a vast and ancient burial chamber is discovered inside one of Finland’s mountains – and a violent creature escapes. Santa is scary here, and his elves aren’t much better. Equal parts action, fantasy, horror and plain old holiday comedy, Rare Exports is a high-concept, low-brow mainstream crowd-pleaser… at least in concept. The material isn’t as much “psycho Santa with an axe” (as is often the case when horror meets Christmas) but “Krampus by another name.” Visually, it’s surprisingly slick: good special effects combined with Finnish shooting locations mean that we get a cold wintry atmosphere made for chills, and some very sharp cinematography. Narratively, the film struggles a bit more: The script doesn’t get to the meat of its premise for a long time, and there’s a sense that the film has more ideas than the means required to execute them. The ending doesn’t quite tie things up enough (the final joke is based on a previous short film by the writer-director, which doesn’t necessarily fit with the rest) and the pacing of the entire film is inconsistent. Nonetheless, there’s some interesting material here, and given Rare Exports’ lack of holiday cheer it can play pretty well at any time other than the weeks leading up to December 25.

  • 1917 (2019)

    1917 (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, December 2020) World War I has long been neglected by Hollywood – WW2 gets all of the attention, and the technical improvements in digital cinema weren’t necessarily used to update the portrait of the Great War as much as they’ve been used to rethink other conflicts. But that’s all over with the arrival of 1917, which not only serves a big wide-scope view of the war that encompasses its multiple facets, but does it with an insane gamble: following two messengers through a pair of very, very, very long continuous shots giving viewers the immediacy of them being involved in the conflict without cuts away from the action. It’s a bravura performance from writer-director Sam Mendes and cinematographer Roger Deakins, and it works surprisingly well, what with the digital wizardry blending everything together as time passes unnaturally fast and yet we find our characters going from one episodic adventure to the other. The feeling left by this sweeping view of a large-scale conflict is gripping, and yet very personal for our two viewpoint characters. There’s something fascinating in seeing how modern filmmaking technology can enhance the immersive experience even further, and thanks to everyone involved in 1917, World War I has never felt so real, immediate and relevant.

  • Trolls World Tour (2020)

    Trolls World Tour (2020)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, December 2020) The cinematic Trolls universe gets a massive upgrade in Trolls World Tour as the storytelling becomes more self-assured and the universe is expanded so that the “Pop Trolls” of the first film are joined by five other tribes of musically-oriented creatures. Pushing the pacing to ludicrous levels and going for a jukebox musical rhythm that thinks that twenty seconds of each song is too long, this sequel is almost relentlessly colourful. The result is bright, fun, slightly overbearing, and yet very cheerful – exactly what’s needed in this glum 2020. The animation is superb, and the visual style of the film extends to accommodate six very different aesthetics as we discover one troll tribe after another. As if that wasn’t enough, the film even serves an inclusivity 201 seminar to the kids by slapping down its heroine as she talks about trolls “being all the same” to prefer a celebration of what each race of trolls brings to the diverse whole. Whew. While I wasn’t overly positive about the first instalment of the series, I’m considerably happier with Trolls World Tour: It’s bigger, better, more ambitious and doesn’t feature the ugly antagonists of the first film nearly as much. I may even be curious to see where else a third film may want to go.

  • Once Upon a Time at Christmas (2017)

    Once Upon a Time at Christmas (2017)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, December 2020) Look, I get it – by mid-December, anyone driven insane by syrupy Christmas store music, inane Christmas movies, the pressure to buy and consume, or the non-negotiable requirements of Christmas family traditions can sour on the holidays. And the impulse to transgress whatever is wholesome in the world is equally strong among horror filmmakers. In that light, Once Upon a Time at Christmas feels like an inevitable production: Down-tempo Christmas tunes provide the soundtrack to serial killers (a psychopathic army veteran and a strip-mall Harley Quinn) rampaging through a small town to the cue of “The Twelve Days of Christmas” –a connection that takes forever for the local police to make. The film seems curiously enamoured of its murderous pair as they pile up the bodies by the dozens and seem unstoppable even in taking on the FBI. This killer-worship goes on right up to the very forgiving conclusion, and as someone who doesn’t react well to stories in which the serial killers are unstoppable or (ick) presented as folk heroes – a curiously unpopular opinion in today’s horror fandom – I was just about ready to fire Once Upon a Time at Christmas into the sun at the fifteen-minute mark. What kept my finger off the launch button was a certain occasional grace in execution – director Paul Tanter may not be working with the best screenplay nor the highest budget, but he occasionally nails a scene, doesn’t let the limits of his production show too much, and does justice to the material when the third quarter of the script gets slightly more interesting. Alas, this comes crashing down once again toward the end as the shortcomings of the screenplay become increasingly vexing, and the conclusion can’t deliver what’s needed for the film to escape its nature as a cheap schlocky disappointment. Once Upon a Time at Christmas is not funny, it’s not scary, and it’s not worth the trouble. I’m ready to go back to the big-city-girl-goes-back-to-her-hometown Christmas rom-coms now. Gladly.

  • Silent Night (2012)

    Silent Night (2012)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, December 2020) Whether Silent Night is a remake, reboot or legacy sequel of the “classic” slasher film Silent Night, Deadly Night is immaterial – it’s still a Christmas-themed slasher, and you know what that means: paper-thin writing, excessive gore, nihilistic humour and straightforward filmmaking. This film doesn’t break the rules, as a psychotic Santa goes around murdering those on his naughty list. Silent Night is really for the hardcore horror fans more than general audiences: it delivers what’s expected in that subgenre, and doesn’t even pretend to be anything more. I suppose that its best audiences are mid-December gorehounds tired of relentless holiday cheer.