- Film Review
- Reviewed By Alan Jones
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3 out of 5
French art house director Leos Carax stays true to form with his first feature since the controversial Pola X in 1999. Once more combining bouts of tedium and pretentious excess with fabulously surreal images and grandiose spasms of inspiration, this metaphysical head-scratcher presents a journey through one man's life cycle. Denis Lavant plays the cypher of eclectic human experience, travelling by limousine between such personas as a beggar woman, an assassin and his quarry, a motion-capture specialist and the same gargoyle creature seen in Carax's contribution to the 2008 anthology movie Tokyo!. Complete with an accordion intermission, Eva Mendes in a burqa, chauffeur Edith Scob referencing her classic Eyes without a Face role and air stewardess Kyle Minogue warbling a song by the Divine Comedy's Neil Hannon, this eccentric rant about technology taking over humanity is a total mess that strains for poetic meaning. Yet it also has enough hypnotic power to carry one's attention through even the clumsiest and obvious passages.
Plot Summary
A mysterious man spends a day being driven around Paris in a limousine. Every time the car stops, he adopts a new identity, ranging from a hitman to a beggar woman, as he experiences a series of strange encounters with the city's residents. Surreal drama, starring Denis Lavant, Edith Scob, Eva Mendes and Kylie Minogue. In French, English and Chinese.
Cast and crew
Cast
- M Oscar / banker / beggar woman / motion capture specialist / "M Merde" / father / accordionist / killer / victim / dying man / man in foyer
- Denis Lavant
- Céline
- Edith Scob
- Eva Grace / Jean
- Kylie Minogue
- Kay M
- Eva Mendes
- Angèle
- Jeanne Disson
- Léa / Élise
- Elise Lhomeau
- Man with birthmark
- Michel Piccoli
Crew
- Director
- Léos Carax
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