Flandres
Bruno Dumont is a favorite son in Cannes, where his anti-intellectual pretensions and the use of nonactors in his films win jury prizes even though audiences don't always share the juries' enthusiasm. In Flanders, he is back with more of the same: A film that had some French viewers talking back to the screen yet received scattered applause at the end. Apparently, you either love this guy's work or hate it. In this review, Dumont will not feel the love.
Pretentious to the core and lacking any context or credible characterizations, Flanders juxtaposes bucolic scenes of life in a farm community, featuring a clutch of dim-witted rustics, with scenes of utter barbarity in an unspecified war. The point may have something to do with what constitutes manhood or absence making the heart grow fonder or perhaps how war deforms character. Who know?
What the film affords is a chance to watch inexpressive characters stumble though scenes of sex and violence, plunging into both activities without much thought or concern for consequences. The only expression of genuine desire comes with the film's final line.
Whatever this Cannes jury thinks of Flanders, the film will make only brief art house appearances.
In Flanders, France, Demester (thick-bodied Samuel Boidin) toils on his farm, seemingly without any family. Recreation consists of an occasional beer with buddies and quick sexual trysts with his childhood friend Barbe (lithe Adelaide Leroux). Neither he nor Barbe consider themselves a couple. For one thing, she is the town slut.
Demester goes off to war along with several locals including Blondel (Henri Cretel) -- an unlikely contrivance -- in an unnamed North African land. (These scenes were shot in Tunisia.) While on a patrol in a barren desert, a patrol with no sense of what the mission might be, his buddies get picked off one by one.
In one firefight, they kill a couple of boy soldiers. Later, they brutally gang rape a woman and kill an old man for no apparent reason. They pay for these crimes with their own deaths at the hands of a local militia. One such death has a rapist castrated before he is killed.
Meanwhile, back on the farm, Barbe rids herself of an annoying pregnancy and winds up in a mental hospital for a spell. Once released, she picks up where she left off, having barnyard sex with any willing male.
Demester, the sole survivor of the patrol, eventually returns from the war. He is a changed man at least insofar as he can finally articulate his feelings about Barbe. What a shame that it took all that carnage for him to find his inner man.
Performances are what you would expect from nonprofessionals. Even a veteran actor might have problems, though, playing characters with so little back story or sense of themselves.
The war scenes are well done on a small budget and do contain moments of highly realistic combat within the fog of war. Yves Cape's camera captures the dueling landscapes of green farms and desolate desert with crisp efficiency.
FLANDERS
3B Prods. in association with Arte France Cinema, Crrav Nord-Pas de Calais/Le Fresnoy
Credits: Writer-director: Bruno Dumont; Producer: Michele Grimaud; Executive producers: Jean Brehat, Rachid Bouchareb; Director of photography: Yves Cape; Costumes: Cedric Grenapin, Alexandra Charles; Editor: Guy Lecorne. Cast: Barbe: Adelaide Leroux; Demester: Samuel Boidin; Blondel: Henri Cretel; Leclercq: David Poulain; Mordac: Patrice Venant.
No MPAA rating, running time 91 minutes.
Pretentious to the core and lacking any context or credible characterizations, Flanders juxtaposes bucolic scenes of life in a farm community, featuring a clutch of dim-witted rustics, with scenes of utter barbarity in an unspecified war. The point may have something to do with what constitutes manhood or absence making the heart grow fonder or perhaps how war deforms character. Who know?
What the film affords is a chance to watch inexpressive characters stumble though scenes of sex and violence, plunging into both activities without much thought or concern for consequences. The only expression of genuine desire comes with the film's final line.
Whatever this Cannes jury thinks of Flanders, the film will make only brief art house appearances.
In Flanders, France, Demester (thick-bodied Samuel Boidin) toils on his farm, seemingly without any family. Recreation consists of an occasional beer with buddies and quick sexual trysts with his childhood friend Barbe (lithe Adelaide Leroux). Neither he nor Barbe consider themselves a couple. For one thing, she is the town slut.
Demester goes off to war along with several locals including Blondel (Henri Cretel) -- an unlikely contrivance -- in an unnamed North African land. (These scenes were shot in Tunisia.) While on a patrol in a barren desert, a patrol with no sense of what the mission might be, his buddies get picked off one by one.
In one firefight, they kill a couple of boy soldiers. Later, they brutally gang rape a woman and kill an old man for no apparent reason. They pay for these crimes with their own deaths at the hands of a local militia. One such death has a rapist castrated before he is killed.
Meanwhile, back on the farm, Barbe rids herself of an annoying pregnancy and winds up in a mental hospital for a spell. Once released, she picks up where she left off, having barnyard sex with any willing male.
Demester, the sole survivor of the patrol, eventually returns from the war. He is a changed man at least insofar as he can finally articulate his feelings about Barbe. What a shame that it took all that carnage for him to find his inner man.
Performances are what you would expect from nonprofessionals. Even a veteran actor might have problems, though, playing characters with so little back story or sense of themselves.
The war scenes are well done on a small budget and do contain moments of highly realistic combat within the fog of war. Yves Cape's camera captures the dueling landscapes of green farms and desolate desert with crisp efficiency.
FLANDERS
3B Prods. in association with Arte France Cinema, Crrav Nord-Pas de Calais/Le Fresnoy
Credits: Writer-director: Bruno Dumont; Producer: Michele Grimaud; Executive producers: Jean Brehat, Rachid Bouchareb; Director of photography: Yves Cape; Costumes: Cedric Grenapin, Alexandra Charles; Editor: Guy Lecorne. Cast: Barbe: Adelaide Leroux; Demester: Samuel Boidin; Blondel: Henri Cretel; Leclercq: David Poulain; Mordac: Patrice Venant.
No MPAA rating, running time 91 minutes.
- 5/24/2006
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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