Horst in Translation ([email protected])
"Saint Amour" is a French/Belgian co-production from this year that resulted in a French-language film. This 100-minute movie was written and directed by Benoît Delépine and Gustave Kervern. The former is a prolific filmmaker and has worked in the industry for decades while the latter is more of a professional actor, but also not a rookie at all when it comes to movie-making. The two stars here are of course Gérard Depardieu and Benoît Poelvoorde, two of France's most known and most successful actors for a while now. They are joined by Vincent Lacoste, but sadly I must say he really just felt like a filler for the most part and his story-lines about his virginity, his girlfriend/wife etc. added very little to the story in terms of memorable content. So maybe he just was in it for the sake of making this longer than 100 minutes. But it's not a problem of the actor, more a problem of the script in general as there were many other weaknesses too and I would also refer this to the general plot idea. No matter how much the two big stars were trying, the references about the father-son relationship were never really as touching or well done as I hoped they would be. That's why I would say that the film was only partially successful from a dramatic perspective. I liked the parts with Depardieu's character's late wife (voiced by Yolande Moreau). They may have been slightly generic, but I thought nonetheless that Depardieu did what he had to do to make the material work. Poelvoorde is decent too and these two definitely elevate the weak material, but not to an extent where I would say this was a great (or even good) film. Sadly, the film, after a solid start, turns into a journey of sexual experiences for everybody involved and none of it felt really realistic or that it made sense at all at times, like the foursome relationship at the very end in the attempts to get the woman pregnant. This actually reminded me of a pretty bad Gottschalk comedy from several decades earlier. And I never understood why father and son were suddenly so close with the driver. It did not feel authentic to me. Only because they were having sex with the same woman? Anyway, pay attention to the filmmakers' clumsy attempts of making the women not look like whores throughout the entire movie as really all their ambitions are about getting to bed with our "heroes". Completely aside from that, the part about alcoholism also felt pretty incomplete. But maybe it was this film's general idea, to deliver a portrayal of how things were at that very point and not to offer solutions, but then they should have picked another ending. Final note: Solène Rigot is as bright and shining as she always is and I am convinced she will turn into one of French cinema's big stars in the coming years. As for her film here, I sadly cannot give a thumbs-up. It's really only worth checking out for the biggest Depardieu/Poelvoorde fans.
