The up and coming director Pierre Salvadori, whose previous film, Wild Target, was one of the most promising French debuts of the decade so far, comes up trumps again with this winning comedy. Francois Cluzet and Guillaume Depardieu play Antoine and Fred, two of life's hopeless failures, who share a dilapidated Parisian flat from which it seems they will never escape. Cluzet is a would be writer who seems unlikely ever to achieve his ambition he spends three years trying unsuccessfully to write a letter to his exgirlfriend. Meanwhile, he halfheartedly tries to make ends meet through occasional work for a karate magazine. Depardieu dreams of becoming a photographer, despite having neither a camera nor any discernible talent for the craft. He tries to stay alive through sporadic bouts of incompetent shoplifting. When their already dire financial situation takes a turn for the worse, the unhappy pair attempt a bungled burglary, with disastrous results.
Salvadori, who revealed a sly wit and wryly sympathetic view of human weakness in Wild Target, here succeeds in getting wonderful performances from his two, leading players. In particular, Depardieu's gangling awkwardness and lost puppy expression recall the first films of his famous father, Gerard. There's a wonderful moment when he declares his love to the apparently soulful young woman (Judith Henry) whom he has been, worshipping from afar. His reaction to her unexpected and disillusioning response almost makes the film worth seeing on its own.
Nothing of any great consequence happens in Les Apprentis - the marketing people have been trying to sell it as France's first slacker movie, a sort of Gallic Withnail And I - but it meanders along with considerable charm, interspersed with some very funny moments. Received wisdom has it that comedy doesn't travel well across national or linguistic borders, and the French film industry produces hub numbers of comic, films which never get further than the domestic market. Les Apprentis, however, is a real little gem which should give great pleasure to anyone who goes to see it.
"The Crow: City of Angels" (18), Virgin, Omniplex, UCIs, Dublin
Pop videos, of course, have their place in the overall scheme of things and can be entertaining enough, but when they are extended to feature length, smothered in pomposity and affectation and passed off as something else, it's hard to summon much enthusiasm.
A sequel to The Crow based on a fantasy comic book series, this is a doom laden, futuristic urban nightmare, directed by pop video maker Tim Pope, about a man (Vincent Perez) who survives his own death, acquires mysterious powers and returns to avenge his brutal killers, with the help naturally of a young woman (Mia Kirshner), who sees him in her dreams.
Despite some strikingly designed sets by Alex McDowell, the extreme violence, titillating, stereotyped sexuality, pretentious, portentous dialogue, gargantuan motorbikes and long leather coats flapping in the wind restrict the interest of this film to teenage heavy metal fans if that isn't an insult to that disparate group.
. Today's other new release which could not be previewed to the press - is Tony Scott's The Fan featuring Robert De Niro as a psychopath stalking the sports star (Wesley Snipes) he admires. The cast also includes Ellen Barkin, John Leguizamo and Benicio Del Toro. The film will be reviewed here next Friday.
