gridoon2018 "Le Serpent" must be the millionth variation on the innocent-man-on-the-run theme; Hollywood has been doing this sort of story for decades. The script, for some reason, makes it perfectly clear right from the start who the bad guy is and how he operates, thereby largely removing the element of surprise; when he starts infiltrating the life of the leading man, we're waiting for the latter to catch up to what we already know. Still, taken on its own terms (and genre), "Le Serpent" is well-made and has some suspenseful moments, though you have to wait for more than an hour for most of them (at 116 minutes, this film is too long). Clovis Cornillac makes a very convincing bad guy. Olga Kurylenko's part is played up in some DVD posters because of her subsequent stardom, but it's really quite small (and yes, it does feature nudity, but she is a little too thin for my tastes here). **1/2 out of 4.

dbdumonteil "Le Serpent" begins as an exciting action-packed thriller ,and its first hour ,although rather derivative ,holds the viewer spellbound .The performances are quite good ,particularly Yvan Attal as a "bad-wisher" friend and a cast again type Pierre Richard in an underwritten part."Revenge is a dish best eaten cold" could be another title for "Le Serpent" ( a tattoo on the fiend's back)Half way through we learn why this old pal doesn't want his old school friend any good.And things begin to deteriorate beyond that point.There's a very unpleasant side:being a punching bag is the worst thing that can happen to a boy (or a girl) at school.People who did not experiment such a thing can't relate to that.Vincent had lost his dad,his mother could not stand her only son's situation.Even if they did not do it on purpose ,all those (probably rich kids) adolescents were responsible for the horrible thing that happened to their unfortunate mate.And Plender revealed himself a coward.The second half sheds new light on Plender:he has actually remained a coward,incapable of fighting without a lawyer (it's the lawyer who takes the chances) or an army of cops (and how dumb these cops must be not to have found the prisoners!).This apparently neuter thriller is in fact the triumph of the establishment which refuses a misfit his place in the sun: the adolescent is forced to give up his studies whereas his torturers will live a protected bourgeois life .The moral is very simplistic and the last picture is a stupid happy end ,which explains why the cops had to be so stupid.

gary-1193 This film is truly excellent - This is one of the best films I've seen in a long while. Both the plot and acting are absolutely first rate. OK so it's in French with subtitles however within just a minutes you feel like your actually in there with them. Anyway it's set in France and should be in French. The sad thing is that there were only three of us watching it which seems to be a pattern with subtitled films these days. No doubt Hollywood will jump on it so you'll be able to see it in a form of English one day - but it won't be the same. All I can say is if you didn't go because you couldn't be 'arsed to read the subtitles you missed something really really special.

writers_reign One of the plus factors about this excellent thriller is that unless you happen to live there you wouldn't know you were in Paris; a few years ago there was an equally fine thriller, A La Petite Semaine which was shot largely in Porte de Clignacourt, North Paris whilst this one was shot mainly a few miles West in La Defense (whose Metro station was used to great effect in Buffet Froid. There have been several notable French films in this genre lately, indeed the most recent, Ne le dis a personne (Tell No One) has only just finished making the rounds, and now here is yet another perhaps just a notch or two below 'personne' but still very, very good. The two have elements in common, an ordinary man suddenly involved in a nightmare and coming under suspicion of murder, there's even a chase sequence similar to but briefer and less tense than the one with Vincent Cluzet which is not the same as saying that Yvan Attal is not every bit as fine an actor as Cluzet and he more than holds his own against Clovis Cornillac (who also had a large role in A La Petite Semaine) who has by far the 'showier' role as a psychotic obsessed with vengeance for a childhood prank that went wrong. Why they had to go to Finland for Attal's wife I'll never know - his own long-time real life partner Charlotte Gainsbourg could have played it equally well - but Minna Haapkyla is certainly adequate. All in all this is a stylish thriller and more than worth watching out for.