This week in movie watching, I caught up on a few films that I’d been wanting to see from around the world including the French dramedy The Intouchables, Samuel L. Jackson and Christina Rucci deep-south film Black Snake Moan, and a difficult British film that explored some tough issues – Fish Tank.

The Intouchables (2011)

The Intouchables is not only a critical and emotional success; it’s the highest grossing French film of all time. The palpable sense of warmth that comes pouring out of this picture is rooted in the affable chemistry between the two unlikely leads. Omar Sy plays Driss, a street-smart hoodlum with a record who’s just hunting for an easy way out. The only reason he crosses paths with Philippe (Francois Cluzet), a top-1% inheritee/paraplegic, is to get him to sign a form saying that he interviewed for the advertised position of live-in-nurse/assistant to ensure that he gets his state benefits – oh and to steal just a little bit from him. When Philippe unexpectedly employs Driss, these two individuals from different worlds begin to teach each other about life, love, and music.

While this setup could just have easily made for a reheated Hallmark film, the natural chemistry and coolly measured directing from first time director/screenwriters Eric Toledano and Olivier Nakache allow this yarn to be spun sans weepy sentimentality.

It’s musing without committing to quirk and doesn’t depend on sour turns to heighten the emotional stakes. Instead of setting up the film as an epitaph to a somber paraplegic, Toledano and Nakache allow the film to earn your interest, starting off with an opening scene that is both heartwarming and just plain funny. Whereas this could have easily turned towards dour melodrama, it relies on levity of character and arc, battling off the bitterness that could have easily sucked the life out of it.

B+

Black Snake Moan (2006)

I’ll admit that I’ve been intrigued by the title of this film for a long time but never pursued it after hearing tell of its lukewarm reviews. However, after finally watching Black Snake Moan, which really, really, really does sound like a filthy porno, it’s a wholly watchable story of redemption with some fine performances even if it’s rather minor in scope.

Christina Ricci seems born for the role of Rae – who is something of the neighborhood bicycle – and when Justin Timberlake, her totally clueless boyfriend, leaves town for Army she ratchets up her slut-tastic nature, stumbling from party to bedroom to party, half-blacked out. When she gets beaten half to death by a dissatisfied dude and dumped on Lazarus’s (Samuel L. Jackson) property, she becomes something of a pet-project. Lazarus sees her arrival as some sort of last shot at redemption so padlocks her to his radiator and vows to rid her of her evil, dong-gobbling ways.

While their relationship is certainly askew, often cockeyed and riddled with Stockholm syndrome, it’s undeniably great to see party-girl Ricci with her breasts sagging out, running amuck AND Sam Jackson slaying some country blues in the midst of a thunderstorm. It’s often messy but it’s got heart. For been-there-done-that Jackson, it finally seems like autopilot is disengaged.

Whether it be a parable on swamp-bound broken hearts, rife with allusion (Lazarus being a Biblical figure raised from the dead by Jesus), or a simple story of captivity and reinvention of self, there are portions of the film that just don’t make sense. The following example is plainly absurd in the context of character motivation and points to pure laziness in screenwriting. As Rae seems to be making real progress in growing out of her fetish to have sex with anything that moves, Lazarus takes her to his gig where he plays some deeply sorrowful bluesy jams. As he’s rocking away, he looks out in the crowd to see her slugging down drinks and getting double-team grinded on by two burly black men. Naturally, he smiles to himself: “That old girl.” It’s only done to set up an impending scenario involving her boyfriend’s raging jealousy and comes across as lethargic writing.

Though no great wonder of cinema, Black Snake Moan is worth watching just for the absurd title, Ricci’s breasts, and Jackson’s crooning alone. 


C+

Fish Tank (2009)

Awash in grim realism, Fish Tank offers a bleak peek into the lower caste of British society and the twisted relationships that occupy there. At the center of this tale is Mia (Katie Jarvis), a tweenage girl who’s surrounded by a host of unscrupulous adults who offer her the parenting prowess of a roomba.

Under the guardianship of her perma-nipple-blasting Mom and her Mom’s flirty new boyfriend Connor (Michael Fassbender), a duo who would likely parent the primadonna, rat-dog type of the slummiest of slumtowns, Mia gets caught up in a series of situations that put her “but-I’m-an-adult” attitude to the test.

As 14-year-old Mia and 30-something Connor get better acquainted, their interactions start to get a little fishy. Each time they look at each other, there’s some unspoken weirdness and as their budding inappropriate relationship grows, punctuated by a sultry moonlit dance, you begin to realize that we’re settling into something of a 21st century Lolita. Our quiet place on the couch turns into a voyeur’s den and the sense of tense awkwardness is so dense you could just eat it up by the gnarly spoonful.

As things take a turn for the worse, we realize it’s not the fall that’s most interesting; it’s Mia’s own realization that she’s living out of her league. In this pending acceptance of her fleeting youth, Mia wrestles with her own innocence with subtle panache.

Fish Tank is Slumdog Millionaire without the millionaire bit. It’s got the captivatingly trashy aspects of a Maury special on teen pregnancy that’s just so hard to turn away from. A winning first performance from Jarvis coupled with the brutish intensity of Fassbender makes this ugly British drama an understated success.

B+

Follow Silver Screen Riot on Facebook
Follow Silver Screen Riot on Twitter