La Résistance de l'air (2015)
Directed by Fred Grivois

Film Review

La Resistance de l'air is the debut feature from French-Canadian director Fred Grivois, who previously worked as an assistant on Jacques Audiard's Un prophète (2009).  Two other Audiard collaborators, screenwriters Thomas Bidegain and Noé Debré, supplied the script, which shares some plot similarities with the one they worked on for Audiard's recent Dheepan (2015).  Like the latter film, Grivois attempts to combine bleak social drama and hard-edged noir thriller, but far less successfully, and his film fails to achieve an effective balance as it shifts back and forth between the two ill-matched genres.    The film's plot has some obvious similarities with James Hadley Chase's 1970 novel Hole in the Head, although this receives no on-screen credit.

That Grivois is strongly influenced by American cinema is apparent in the film's distinctly un-Gallic presentation, which is grittier and gloomier than that of your average French thriller.  Competently directed as the film is, it has a job trying to sustain the tension and whilst it promises much it doesn't really take off, spending most of its time building up to situations that never materialise.  In his lead role, Reda Kateb (one of the emerging talents of French cinema in recent years) gives the film his best shot but his commendable angst-ridden performance is somehow lost, undermined by some laboured mise-en-scène and a script that lacks character depth and coherence.   Whilst Johan Heldenbergh brings the appropriate note of menace and foreboding to his character, Ludivine Sagnier is completely wasted in an underwritten and mostly superfluous supporting role.  Overall, La Resistance de l'air is a mundane thriller that, despite a strong central performance from Kateb, fails to make much of an impression.

Film Synopsis

Vincent leads a peaceful but uneventful life with his wife Delphine and daughter Alexia.  He has taken up rifle shooting as a hobby to escape the monotony of an otherwise empty existence, and has graduated to championship level in his sport of choice.   When his ageing father falls ill, Vincent has no choice but to accommodate him in his already crowded home.  If only he had more money, he could move to a bigger house where life would be so much more comfortable.   A chance meeting at the rifle range provides Vincent with what seems to be an easy solution to his financial worries.  A stranger who call himself Renaud offers him a contract which, if fulfilled, will earn him some easy cash.  Unable to resist the bait, Vincent accepts it, but soon lives to regret the decision as his life starts to spiral out of control...