Un ami parfait (2006) - film review

When Julien Rossi, a journalist, regains consciousness in hospital, he has no recollection of how he came to be there.  Neither has he any idea how he sustained the severe head injury that has caused his partial loss of memory.  He doesn’t even recognise the woman who claims to be his girlfriend, Marlène.  The only woman he can remember having any feelings for is someone called Anna, but no one by that name has visited him in hospital.  He is surprised at the coolness with which his closest friend, Lucas, greets him when they meet up.  His surprise turns to disbelief when he learns that Lucas is living with Anna and that, just before his accident, Julien resigned his post on a newspaper.  Gradually, Julien’s memory comes back to him and he relives the dramatic incidents that led up to his near-fatal injury.

With its atmospheric, almost Hitchcockian beginning, Un ami parfait immediately has the feel of classic French noir-style thriller.  Unfortunately, first impressions can often be misleading and what starts out as an intriguing and stylish polar very quickly degenerates into a plodding, cliché-laden mass of unconvincing nonsense.  The story it tells is certainly topical, dealing with corruption in the food manufacturing industry that ties in with fears over prions and CJD, but the plot is so poorly constructed and far fetched that it is a strain to take any of it seriously.

The film was directed by Francis Girod, who distinguished himself in the 1970s with his sardonic black comedies Le Trio infernal (1974) and René la canne (1976).  In later years, Girod never regained the inspiration and flair that he showed in his early films, and Un ami parfait, the last film he made before his death in 2006, exemplifies his decline towards mediocrity.  In this instance, Girod’s failure may have been caused, or at least exacerbated, by a tragedy which struck on the fourth day of the shoot: Humbert Balsan, the film’s well-known producer, hanged himself in his company’s office whilst suffering from acute depression.    

The film invites unfavourable comparisons with Christopher Nolan’s excellent thriller Memento (2000).  Both films involve a man suffering from memory loss who desperately struggles to piece together fragments of memory to make sense of his present predicament.  However, whereas Momento holds our attention with its innovative narrative structure, stunning direction and tour de force central performance, Un ami parfait seems to drift aimlessly and is totally lacking in focus and artistic integrity.  There is one saving grace, a very commendable turn from Antoine de Caunes, but even this cannot make up for the film’s shortcomings in the areas of script and direction.  However, on the plus side, it may just put you off eating chocolate...

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