|
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Watching Cédric Kahn’s adaptation of the Georges Simenon novel is like spending two hours in a car driven by an angry, sweating drunk. As in his previous film, Roberto Succo, a demoralizing, relentless portrait of a real-life serial killer, Kahn demonstrates that awful people are indeed awful. Antoine (Jean-Pierre Darroussin as a leaner, charmless Wallace Shawn) gets pissed off when his wife (Carole Bouquet) is late for their trip down South to visit their kids at camp. Then he gets pissed. He subjects her to his boozy fury every mile of the way, stopping only to get a shot of Scotch at each passing roadside bar. There’s a lot of baggage in this relationship, but mostly Antoine is a troll, and it’s a relief when the wife escapes to take the train and is replaced, more or less, by a stranger (Vincent Deniard) Antoine meets at one of his waterhole stops. Only those who haven’t noticed the radio and TV news reports that are broadcast throughout will fail to surmise where this is heading, with the stranger serving much the same purpose as the fugitive in Flannery O’Connor’s "A Good Man Is Hard To Find." "A bit of friendly advice," says the stranger when the car is stopped by the police. "Don’t breathe in their face." This is the kind of movie that breathes in your face. In French with English subtitles. (106 minutes)
BY PETER KEOUGH
|
