Sempre vivu! (2007) - film review

A remote Corsican village is in a state of turmoil.  Ange, the local patriarch, has recently launched a drama workshop in a last ditch attempt to keep the village alive and arrest the decline in its population.  But on the very day that a cabinet minister is due to arrive to sign an important contract that may save the village, Ange decides to drop dead.  The contract has to be signed at any cost, but without Ange’s guiding hand the play that was to have been performed risks turning into a farce...

Undeniably one of the weirder French films in recent years.  For his first feature, actor-turned director Robin Renucci combines off-the-wall black comedy with the pantomime-like stylisation of commedia dell’arte to deliver a film that is distinctive but also slightly off-putting in its freakiness.  The stunning Corsican landscape just about holds its own against the outlandishly over-the-top performances from what is probably the ugliest acting troupe outside a Pier Paolo Pasolini film.  Of course, appearances can be deceptive and, just as Corsica has a less than wholesome side to it, so the characters in the film turn out to be far more than just misshapen gargoyles carved by a blind stone mason.

Sempre vivu! (which translates as Still Alive!) is a worthy attempt on the part of Renucci to convince us that Corsica is not, as some believe, dead and forgotten, but still very much alive - just like the town mayor in the story, who refuses to depart this world even after suffering a fatal coronary.  The film’s main strength, its novelty value, quickly dissipates and actually becomes a tad irksome when the weaknesses in the screenplay and Renucci’s directing become evident.   The film will appeal most to aficionados of the old Italian farce.  There is much to laugh at (the central premise of a libidinous ghost disrupting the lives of his former entourage is a good one, although not fully capitalised on), even if the humour is probably an acquired taste and veers towards the needlessly vulgar in places.   It’s a reasonable stab at a first film, but definitely not one that will appeal to all tastes.

© James Travers 2010

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