Les Boys series

(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.

(On TV, August 2020) There’s some irony in saying that the first half of Les Boys III feels like an episode, considering that the series would eventually shift (with many of its actors) into a five-season TV show. But that happened after this third entry in the series, a French-Canadian comedy about hockey and the camaraderie between members of a team. The film begins as one of the characters literally returns from Europe, three years after the events of its France-set prequel. He’s greeted warmly, but coming back isn’t as easy as it seems at first: their local brasserie looks outclassed by a new class of sports bar, and the owner of the sports bar starts leeching away players to another team. But as usual, Les Boys III has a very large ensemble cast, and proving them all with something to do requires some plotting backflips that give the impression, especially at first, that these are disconnected subplots. The impression persists until the end in some cases, but the movie does get down to its plotting halfway through, confronting old school and new school for the players until, obviously, everyone reunites. It’s all good for fans of the characters, but this third entry does feel looser than the second film, and perhaps more insular as well – I’d have trouble recommending it as an entry point in the series. Les Boys III does feel like another episode, though: everyone gets a subplot, and the cast largely remains the same. (After providing the soundtrack for the first two films, singer Eric Lapointe steps up as an actor here.) It’s rather fun if you’ve been following the series so far, but there’s a feeling that it has already peaked.

(On TV, August 2020) In the universe of French-Canadian movies, Les Boys is practically an institution. It’s not a great movie, but it’s close to the reality of its audiences, studded with local stars and was an immense commercial success. Not only was it the highest-grossing Canadian film of 1997, it was followed by no less than three sequels and a five-season TV series featuring more or less the same cast. You can call it essential viewing for French-Canadian fans… which makes it embarrassing that it took me 22 years to watch it. The film does start well, as it introduces the members of an amateur hockey team the likes of which pepper French-Canadian cities. Our characters work during the day so that they can play once a week at night: Hockey is their third place, and it wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the local brasserie after the game. Whatever plot is in the film takes the form of a high-stakes wager between the team sponsor and a local mob boss – leading to a match where either the sponsor gets his $50,000 debt erased, or he signs away the ownership of the brasserie to the mob boss. But that’s a mere pretext for following our ensemble cast, as they have romantic issues at home and come together to play. When Les Boys ends (with the expected victory, don’t worry), it feels like half of a movie: the cast is so large and so top-heavy in local celebrities that it spreads itself thin: We’re introduced to all the members of the team, and even just showing them all at home takes somewhere like fifteen minutes. Unable to focus, Les Boys ends up with half a plot, and an immensely predictable one at that. Of course, this is not a film to be watched for narrative intrigue – the point is the portrayal of characters not unlike their audience, and the triumph of victory that erases a number of their ongoing personal issues. Les Boys is not refined, but it’s quite a good time – While I’ve never played hockey, the people feel like people I’d know, doing familiar things and speaking in the thickest joual imaginable.