(Apologies up front for not using names in the review, but people are introduced and disappeared so I never caught names)
A father, his daughter, his son and his son's friend go into the wilderness to spend some time with the father's friend and former collaborator for a few days. While there things go sideways in a WTF coming of age tale.
While I like this film to some degree, the truth is this film is a complete and utter mess narratively. Director Philippe Lesage brings together 11 people and manages to focus on none of them, moving them around in ways that make no sense. Yes the individual scenes mostly work on their own but over all none of it really hangs together, killing not only a character who barely registers but the dog as well.
My feelings for the film have gone up and down since I saw it. Mostly I trade off liking moments (Rock Lobster is going to be what people latch on to) and realizing that the film has massive problems.
The problems begin with the fact that most of the characters don't really exist because after they are introduced they disappear. Everything is focused on the friend of the son who wants to sleep with his best friends sister. I would ask why he's the focus when he isn't that interesting a character, except there are no other characters in the film. The father is a wine obsessed turd, the daughter is the sex object and everyone else is barely there. The most telling clue as to how badly the characters are drawn and the plot is a mess in the fact that the main character, the friend of the son, has only two scenes with his supposed best friend. They almost never appear together, yet are so chummy that they go on vacation together. WTF? The son is such a non-entity that I completely forgot about him for most of the film.
Truth be told by the end everyone is so shitty to each other you will wonder why are they friends.
The plotting is just as bad with things happening, just because. Big blow outs happen one minute and everything is hunky dory the next. Someone dies (I think they die), and then nothing. It feels like the director didn't know what to do so he made it up. Let send everyone down a river because... The father obsesses about who switched his wine because he has nothing else to do. Scenes at times feel like pieces of long moments that got trimmed down.(why do I think there is a five hour cut of this that makes more sense)
It's a film that rambles all over the place and yet manages to go no where.
The actors are lost. The great Irene Jacob appears late in the film and does nothing but sit there.
This is two hours and thirty five minutes that are a waste of your life - yes I really like pieces- but that is all this is, pieces
As good as the pieces (particularly the literal needle drops) are there is no way I can tell you watch this over long trip to nowhere.
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