Edy (2005)
Directed by Stéphan Guérin-Tillié

Film Review

Stéphan Guérin-Tillié makes a promising directorial debut with this deeply unsettling melange of jet-black comedy and suspense thriller.  The main attraction is the casting of heavyweights François Berléand and Philippe Noiret (the latter in one of his last roles), who bring an intensity and subtle streak of subversive humour to what might otherwise have been a pretty bland affair.  The film is imaginatively shot and is sufficiently weird to hold our attention, but the story feels hopelessly fragmented, lacking both cohesion and credibility.  Whilst Edy is far from perfect, its director certainly makes an impression and has been likened to a new Tarantino.

Film Synopsis

The joie de vivre has definitely gone out of Edy's life.  He has made a successful career for himself as an insurance agent, but as his retirement comes ever nearer he finds he has less and less enthusiasm for his work.  In the end he decides that he cannot go on.  Life is too boring to bother with any more.  So, resolved to end it all, he kidnaps one of his clients and drives him to an out-of-the-way sand pit.  Edy then hands his bewildered client a gun and tells him to shoot.  Then - catastrophe.  How could such a simple plan go so badly wrong?  To add to his woes, Edy now finds he is stuck with a dead body which he has to somehow get rid of.  Panic-stricken, he looks up his old friend Louis and is not encouraged by the advice he is offered.  To save himself, it seems that Edy must now find the wife of the dead man and kill her.  Fate is now having a jolly good laugh at poor Edy's expense...