Tout pour l’oseille (2004) - film review

Charlie is desperate to pay back the money he owes his friend, Frédo, a struggling artist who makes ends meet by working as an interior decorator.  With the help of his unstable and slightly retarded brother Paulo, Charlie embarks on a series of minor criminal exploits which inevitably turn out for the worse.  Charlie’s girlfriend, Prune, is a cleaner for a company that ostensibly raises money for medical research.  On discovering where the money he is kept, she suggests that Charlie and Frédo should steal it, thereby resolving all their financial problems.  Unfortunately, Charlie insists that Paolo should play a part in the robbery…

What is essentially no more than a low-grade chaotic farce, a silly take on the caper movie, is made surprisingly enjoyable thanks to its impressive cast, which includes some of the most promising young actors in France today.  Bruno Putzulu is amusing as a sympathetic but thoroughly hapless young man who seems destined to fail at everything Fate throws at him.  Sylvie Testud leaves us in no doubt she has a natural flair for comedy, even if she obviously has far greater talent than her role in this film allows her to show.  Then there’s Laurent Lucas playing (of all things) a comical skinhead retard – a million miles from the kind of part he is best known for (the darkly introspective sort who looks like a graduate from the Hannibal Lecter school of charm and normality).  If there’s just one reason for watching this film it is to see Lucas pushing his own personal envelope and showing what he is capable of.  There are also some nice contributions from Alexia Portal, Thomas Jouannet and Patrick Braoudé, although all three actors are criminally underused, largely as a result of a script which merits at least three more re-writes.  With so much talent at his disposal, you’d have thought director Bertrand Van Effenterre would have had an easy job making a great film.  Unfortunately, the rambling storyline, contrived comic situations and unconvincing characterisation count against him, somewhat diminishing the film’s impact and entertainment value.

© James Travers 2007

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