MESRINE: PART ONE - DEATH INSTINCT - a new gangster classic

Jean-François Richet's French gangster biopic is the movie that PUBLIC ENEMIES should've been: part character study, part thriller, part prison break-out movie. It's well-directed, emotionally and intellectually satisfying and superbly acted. It evokes a sense of time and place and involves the audience without glamourising the subject matter.

Richet splits his biopic into two parts, in the manner of Steven Soderbergh's recent biopic of Che Guevara. The movies are self-contained but as soon as I watched one I was desperate to see the other, and they work best as a whole.

Part One opens as a tense thriller - a plump, middle-aged Jacques Mesrine (an award-winning performance from Vincent Cassel) and an enigmatic woman (Chloe Sevigny) are ambushed by the police in late 1970s Paris. The movie then switches to a more youthful Mesrine, witnessing horrific interrogations as a soldier in the Franco-Algerian war - the start of his brutalisation perhaps? After the war, he rejects a bourgeois life and joins his childhood friend working for local mob boss (Gerard Depardieu). Mesrine is smarter than the average thug, more charming, and more honourable. Cassel has us believing that he does want to make good for the sake of his kid, but ultimately, he can't keep straight, and abandons his family for a life on the run in Canada with a similarly inventive, ruthless crim. played by an unrecognisable and ruthless Cecile de France.

The resulting movie is gripping, emotionally affecting, and impartial without being indifferent. Cassel is deeply impressive - but so are Depardieu and de France. The period and mood are brilliantly evoked - style serves content. This film is, simply put, a new gangster classic.

MESRINE PART ONE won three Cesars,for Best Actor, Best Sound and Best Director. MESRINE: PART ONE played Toronto 2008 and opened last year in Belgium, France, Russia, Hungary, Estonia, the Czech Republic and Croatia. It opened earlier this year in Poland, the Netherlands, Israel, Italy, Turkey, Norway, Germany, Denmark, Greece and Brazil. It opens in the UK and US on August 7th.

Random DVD round-up 1 - A SECRET / UN SECRET

UN SECRET is an epic French true-life story set between the years of 1935 and 1985. It tells the story of how François Grimbert uncovered his family's secret past. We first meet François as a small boy in post-war France. He concocts a romantic tale of how his mother, a glamorous model (Cécile De France) and his father, an talented athlete (Patrick Bruel) met and married. He also concocts an imaginary brother who is as talented and athletic as his father, and can deflect the feeling of inferiority he feels. This issue of the imaginary elder brother provokes his parents, and François turns to family friend Louise (Julie Depardieu) for answers. She tells him the real story of his family and the movie deftly intertwines the pre-war and post-war years with "present day" footage of François and his father.

It turns out that François really did have an elder brother. Before the war, his father, Maxime, was married to Hannah Stirn (Ludivine Sagnier) and they had a son called Simon. When the occupation began, Hannah and her family identified with their fellow Jews, were nervous, and grudgingly wore the yellow star. By contrast, Maxime was as assimilationist. He refused to wear the star, thought the French would never turn on their own, and only fled to the safety of a village in extremis. This conflicting attitude toward racial identity causes conflict between Maxime and Hannah, but the real difficulty is Maxime's strong attraction to his sister-in-law Tania (François' mother). The secret at the heart of the movie concerns how Hannah reacts under the pressure of political terror combined with the fear of losing her husband, and how François' mother and father eventually got together after the war.

UN SECRET is a handsomely produced, intricately constructed, well-acted drama. I was surprised by how well the film-makers managed to keep up suspense and also by just how restrained they had been. The simmering passion between Maxime and Tania is shown by glances rather than crude gestures, (as, indeed, is Louise' homosexuality), and the mental disintegration of Hannah is very subtle - and brilliantly played by Ludivine Sagnier. The only slight mis-tep was a rather bizarre final scene in a pet cemetary and the rather anonymous role for Mathieu Amalric, who barely has anything to do.

UN SECRET was released in 2007 and 2008. It opens in Germany on December 18th and is available on DVD. UN SECRET was nominated for 11 Cesars, of which Julie Depardieu won Best Supporting Actress. It was beaten in most categories by LA MOME and THE DIVING BELL AND THE BUTTERFLY.

THE SINGER/QUAND J'ETAIS CHANTEUR - Depardieu at his best

Writer-director Xavier Giannoli is to be congratulated on making a film of rare patience and emotional intelligence and of drawing a breath-taking and career-redefining performance from Gérard Depardieu. In THE SINGER, Depardieu has a wonderfully multi-faceted character to play and he matches a subtle and beautiful script with his most delicate and charming performance. His character, Alain Moreau, is an ageing lounge singer who was very famous in France in his youth but is now reduced to singing at tea-dances and in provincial nightclubs. He is over-weight and dies his hair in a vain attempt to stay young and please the crowds. He dresses in a vulgar fashion and sings old-fashioned songs. But Alain is disarmingly honest. He knows that women only sleep with him to make their husbands jealous and realises that his commitment to the old standards is rather ridiculous. Nonetheless, he takes pride in the fact that he makes people happy and still plays with a live band. He seems happy in himself despite his somewhat lonely existence.

One night, Alain encounters and beds a much younger, beautiful, enigmatic woman called Marion (Cécile De France). She cuts and runs the next day. The rest of the film is a protacted dialogue between the two. He likes her, feels he understands her previous hurt, and that he can help. She is fascinated by him but also repelled by him. After all, she could easily have the good-looking younger man in her office.

At times, I found THE SINGER frustrating because the constant cat and mouse game was so stubbornly resisting a resolution. But I also believe that this is the strength of the movie. Giannoli resists all the conventions of the romantic drama. We feel that these are real characters - quirky, irrational, capricious, warm-hearted. To that end, THE SINGER is a wonderful mix of charm and astringency.

THE SINGER/QUAND J'ETAIS CHANTEUR played Cannes 2006. It was released in France and Belgium in 2006 and in Germany, Australia, Argentina, Turkey and Spain earlier this year. It is currently on release in the UK.

ORCHESTRA SEATS/FAUTEUILS D'ORCHESTRE - charming date movie

ORCHESTRA SEATS is on-paper a pretty mediocre romantic-drama/comedy written and directed by Danièle Thompson. But is has a low-key charm and optimism that I find hard to resist.

Technically this is very workman-like project: there won't be any prizes for camera-work or editing. In fact, they are downright poor. Similarly, the plot is full of incredible coincidences and the whole movie is an extended meet-cute.

Essentially, we have three people who have achieved, but are to some extent dissatisfied with, worldly success. All three have a big night taking place around a local Paris brasserie. Valérie Lemercier plays Catherine Versen - a foul-mouthed but hysterically funny daytime TV star, opening in a theatre production and desperately wanting a serious film break from an American producer played by Sydney Pollack. Albert Dupontel plays Jean-François Lefort, a celebrated concert pianist who is desperate to get out of the concert circuit and begin a more humble life. He is petrified that his wife, Valentine (Laura Morante) won't make the move with him. Meanwhile, Claude Brasseur plays the old widower, Jacques Grumberg. On the same night as Catherine's theatre opening and Jean-François' concert, Jacques is auctioning off the art-collection he spent years amassing with his wife. Jacques is also dating a younger woman (Annelise Hesme, best known to Brits as the girl in the Renault ads), much to his son, Fred's, chagrin.

What unites these people is their patronage of the local cafe, where a young girl from the country is a waitress. Jessica (Cécile de France) has a naive innocence that brings out the best in all concerned and forces the requisite happy ending, not least for Fred (the not unattractive Christopher Thompson.)

As I said, a lot of the plotting of this movie is pretty hokey but as a nice meditation on life and love it has a quiet charm that is exactly opposite to the forced sentimentality of most Hollywood romantic-comedies. This isn't a movie to seek-out, but if you're looking for a less crass date movie, it'll fit the bill.

ORCHESTRA SEATS opened in France, Belgium, Israel, italy, Greece, Germany, Canada and Brazil in 2006. It opened in the US last Friday and opens in the UK next Friday. I topens in Argentina on March 29th and in Australia on April 12th.

THE SCIENCE OF SLEEP/LA SCIENCE DES REVES - kooky, romantic, beautiful

THE SCIENCE OF SLEEP is a visual and imaginative tour de force from writer-director Michel Gondry (THE ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND). Some say that unshackled from post-modern cult writer, Charlie Kauffman, Gondry has slipped into beautiful but self-indulgent and ultimately boring whimsy. I beg to differ. While I can see the intelligence and conceptual brilliance of a movie like ETERNAL SUNSHINE, Kauffman's films have always left me a little cold. The characters always seemed like pawns in a clever game and I found the movies emotionally sterile. (Perhaps this is the point?) By contrast, THE SCIENCE OF SLEEP is deeply personal and each character is well-loved and engaging, despite going on a surreal, sometimes creepy romantic thrill-ride.

Our hero is a young artist called Stéphane with a child-like fondness for inventing things and optical illusions. Lured back to Paris from Mexico by his French mother with the offer of a creative job, Stéphane finds himself stuck as a typesetter in a basement full of kooky colleagues. The most memorable of these is a middle-aged alleged love-monster called Guy who mercilessly takes the piss out of his co-workers and upstages the lead characters whenever he is on screen. Faced with such a numbing job, Stéphane retreats into his richly imagined dreamworld. Here he is the star of his own Blue Peter style childrens TV show; he can kick his boss out of the window; and he can have fantasies about his co-worked Martine. However, events really kick off when he meets his shy neighbour Stéphanie. At first, he fancies her friend, but soon, Stéphanie's obession with rescuing knitted dolls and making things wins Stéphane over. The question is: will Stéphanie allow herself to be drawn into this charming, romantic dream-world and find love.

It should now be clear that you cannot approach this film with a cynical mind-set. The whole point is to confront us with an infantile man and ask us what is wrong with his reversion into dreams. To that end, the production & costume design betrays an attention to detail not seen since THE ROYAL TENENBAUMS and the characters have a similar habit of saying exactly what they think, no matter how naif or down-right bizarre that seems to us.

If the movie walks a fine line between whimsy and ridiculousness, it stays on the right side thanks largely to a laugh out loud funny script and outstanding performances from all lead and supporting actors. Among the supporting cast, Alain Chabat (LE GOUT DES AUTRES) is outstanding as Guy. And as far as the leads go, while Charlotte Gainsbourg is absolutely fine as Stéphanie, the revelation is Gael García Bernal as Stéphane. I have always liked his work but it has all been off a piece - THE CRIMES OF PADRE AMARO to THE KING to BAD EDUCATION, he has played sexually confident, almost predatory men. By contrast, in THE SCIENCE OF SLEEP he plays a shy, child-like character completely convincingly and - more of a revelation - plays comedy really well, moving as easily between English, Spanish and French as his character moves between dreams and reality.

THE SCIENCE OF SLEEP played Berlin 2006 and went on release in France, Germany, the US, Belgium, Russia, Denmark, Israel, Portugal, Mexico, Poland, the Netherlands, Greece, Hong Kong, Sweden, Turkey and Estonia in 2006. It opened in Finland and Italy in January 2007 and is currently on release in Spain and the UK. It opens in Japan on April 7th, in Australia on May 3rd and in Argentina on August 9th. THE SCIENCE OF SLEEP is also available on Region 1 DVD.

HANNIBAL RISING - he knows Kung Fu

HANNIBAL RISING is an unnecessary prequel to the Hannibal Lektor stories, RED DRAGON and SILENCE OF THE LAMBS. I call it unnecessary because I always thought it was scary to see Lektor as an evil that simply existed rather than the result of some childhood trauma. The unexplained is infinitely more frightening that the neatly diagnosed. Of course, in a world of shameless cash-ins, a prequel was a dead cert, and here we have it.

The movie is directed by Peter Webber of THE GIRL WITH A PEARL EARRING fame, and so looks handsome and contains fine performances as far as the absurd script allows. It opens on the Eastern Front of World War Two, with the aristocratic Lektor family being caught in the cross-fire of the Nazis, Soviets and mercenary partisans. Trapped in a cabin with the latter, Lektor as a young ten-year old sees them cannibalise his young sister. This would be a plot spolier (it takes Hannibal half the film to remember) were it not so bloody obvious from the start. Lektor survives the attack and as a young adult escapes a Soviet orphanage - gaily pole-vaulting over the Berlin Wall - to join his widowed Aunt in France. In another authorial choice that stretches credibility, the aunt turns out to be a glamourous Japanese woman who teaches him Samurai skills (!) and condones his murderous crimes of vengeance. Hannibal then attends medical school, becomes involved in the persecution of Vichy criminals and returns to his home to extract revenge.

Gaspard Ulliel (A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT) and Gong Li do as well as can be expected with their roles as Hannibal and Lady Murasaki. Ditto Rhys Ifans as the original cannibal. But the whole this is transparent nonsense and even more high-camp than the Anthony Hopkins movies. I am also slightly disturbed by the casual way in which the Holocaust is used as a sort of narrative crutch for the movie. Clealy, one to avoid.

HANNIBAL RISING is on release in the US, UK, France, Australia, Russia, Canada, Denmark, Italy, Latvia and Turkey. It opens in Germany, Austria, Finland, Iceland and Norway on February 16th, and in Belgium and Estonia on February 23rd. t opens in Singapore on March 1st, the Netherlands on March 8th, Hong Kong on March 15th, Japan on March 31st and in Malaysia on April 14th.

RUSSIAN DOLLS/LES POUPEES RUSSES - The Return of Eurofromage

RUSSIAN DOLLS is an amiable film. A lot of the scenes are played well, especially in the first half, and given that the movie is shot on Digital Video, Paris looks suitably dreamy. We should all live in such apartments! But, having said all this, ultimately, RUSSIAN DOLLS is a film that frustrates with its incoherent narrative structure.

RUSSIAN DOLLS is actually a sequel featuring a bunch of thirty-something Europeans, all of whom lived together in their student days. I have to confess to not seeing the original movie, and the sequel does not make me want to rush back to it. As in the original, RUSSIAN DOLLS focuses on Xavier, a Parisian writer played by Romain Duris, and his complicated love life. Xavier claims that he is in love with is best friend, Martine, played by Audrey Tautou (soon to be seen in the Da Vinci Code flick.) She is a single-mother environmental campaigner. Yet while Xavier looks after her kid and claims love, he also shows her precious little empathy when she is going through emotional difficulties – unceremoniously kicking her out of bed to make way for his latest squeeze, Kassia. Meanwhile, Xavier is crashing with his friend, Isabelle (played by the marvellous Cecile de France) a gay financial news reporter. Desperate to cheer up his frail grandfather by introducing him to a non-existent fiancée, Xavier persuades Isabelle to put on – the horror! – a dress and pretend for an evening.

In all these intertwining relationships that make up the first hour of the movie, I felt engaged with the characters and emotionally invested in how things would turn out. There is a lot of oh-so-clever use of editing and fantasy sequences (Audrey Tautou dressed as a princess, explaining to her son about the seven Princes Charming she has dated etc) which I found got in the way of the drama rather than enhancing my enjoyment of the film. But a lot of people were laughing so what do I know?

However, in the second hour the movie takes a sharp right-turn into an entirely different story. The three key female protagonists are dropped and we enter a new world! Xavier is now torn between a screenwriter who loves him, played by the unimpressive Kelly Reilly, and a supermodel whose memoirs he is ghost-writing. This whole segment seemed to me unrealistic, inauthentic and just plain bizarre. Moreover, I found the writer-director’s treatment of the Xavier character a little irritating. Here was a man who had been a bit of a shit to all the women in his life, but you know, he is charming and handsome and he can change, so that’s okay? In the final scene, we see a brief flash to the Audrey Tautou character, in a belated recognition that one of the key characters had been dropped. Frankly, the whole thing seemed stretched rather thin.

RUSSIAN DOLLS was released in France, Australia, Germany and Austria in 2005. It is currently on extremely limited release in the UK and US.