REVIEW: DVD Release: Suddenly, Last Winter

Film: Suddenly, Last Winter
Release date: 7th June 2010
Certificate: 15
Running time: 80 mins
Director: Gustav Hofer, Luca Ragazzi
Starring: Gustav Hofer, Luca Ragazzi
Genre: Documentary
Studio: Network
Format: DVD
Country: Italy

In February 2007 the Italian government presented a draft law that acknowledged the legal rights of unmarried and gay couples, however, this was met with vitriol throughout the country.

Luca and Gustav are two arts journalists who have been in a gay relationship for eight years. Following the election of Prodi’s centre-left coalition at the 2006 election, they chart the progression of that party’s proposed laws that will allow them the same civil rights as heterosexual couples. However, with Prodi’s party neutered by their tiny majority, the DICO law, spelling out the rights for co-habitants, is quickly attacked by the right-wing authorities – the various conservative parties, and the Vatican, whose independent state nevertheless pushes to dictate the laws of Italy.

The impact of this lobbying from the elite upon the public, particularly the young, is demonstrated through various set-pieces such as the right-wing organised Family Day (their response to the DICO law), the aftermath of a church celebration, and Gay Pride 2007…


It is at these events, where the filmmakers confront those regular members of the public, that the film finds its feet. Beginning with a church celebration, Luca and Gustav take to the streets and find themselves amongst a swarm of young people with the groan of the Pope fresh in their ears. Asking why they are in opposition to their civil rights – Gustav, much to Luca’s later chagrin, is keen to reveal their well-established gay credentials – the filmmakers are met with frank and unrestrained admonishment of their sexuality. Outright telling them that their relationship is “against human nature,” what is curious about these exchanges is the way both the interviewers and their subjects seem oblivious to the reality of the situation. The latter appear to assume the two lovers (and presumably the homosexual population as a whole) will simply get over it, while Luca concludes that the two have been living in a protected “microcosm of our own…an illusion.”

This might go some way to explain the stylistic approach of the film’s opening sequence, which presents the domestic bliss of the couple in a horrible mash-up of YouTube-style video diary, a 1950s demonstrative service broadcast, and a child’s educational narrative. Obviously intended to create ironic comic effect, the sequence instead merely comes off as a gay version of The Simple Life, or any number of those American TV shows that cement the stereotype of a retarded nation, with library music blaring the obvious, explaining to the viewers how they should be feeling. This works well at one point of the movie, though, where a fascist march preceding the Family Day event is presented with impish B-movie sounds to match the spooky visuals - a genuine lynch mob marching with candles and flaming rolls of paper, the 20th century pitchforks and torches.

Elsewhere, other stylistic flourishes include presenting the corridors of power as a symmetrical, anonymous, labyrinth where symmetrical and anonymous politicians fade in and out of doorways to no conclusion at all. There’s an impressive sequence in which the two filmmakers sit on a couch watching the initial right-wing reaction to the DICO laws gain momentum, each view point added as a pixilated square running a border around the screen, until these video clips of intolerance finally squeeze the two out of the frame completely.

Which is ironic, since this is the main failure of the documentary. As Luca himself says of their opponents near the end of the film: “They say the same things. They’re broken records.” The viewer too is left similarly exasperated; surely after hearing the views of just five ‘nutters’ you don’t really need an hour more. The film seems to work on the basis of an assumed audience, one that is rational enough to reject those claims that the DICO laws will lead to the “extinction of society”, and those recalling “the fall of the Roman Empire” (!), and, as such, hardly any lucid counter arguments are put forward against these sentiments. It seems the filmmakers are taking the approach of presenting the homophobia prevalent in Italy with the intention of embarrassing their leaders into action (the English language narration perhaps lending support to this aim).

Since the counter is so poorly presented, it is with the relationship of the filmmakers themselves that we find any interest in what could have otherwise been a mere news reel. Gustav’s increasing bravado as the homophobia becomes more intense, and he refuses to back down, and Luca’s converse reticence as the events heat up. One exchange between the two sums up their attitudes perfectly, when Luca argues that “you should be careful saying we’re a couple,” and Gustav replies, “I want the right to say it in a square” - fascist fire branders be damned!


In all, this amateurish documentary from two professional journalists does have its charms, but ultimately fails to make its own case. For two filmmakers with so much at stake in the subject matter, they tend to take a voyeuristic approach to the debate rather than engaging in a manner that could be of any real help to their cause. JGZ

REVIEW: DVD Release: Sous Le Soleil De Satan

Film: Sous Le Soleil De Satan
Release date: 22nd March 2010
Certificate: 15
Running time: 93 mins
Director: Maurice Pialat
Starring: Gerard Depardieu, Sandrine Bonnaire, Maurice Pialat
Genre: Drama
Studio: Eureka
Format: DVD
Country: France

Given the subject matter, Sous Le Soleil De Satan (Under The Sun Of Satan) courted much reaction and controversy upon its original release, although it did take home the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 1987.

Based on a novel of the same name by Georges Bernanos, Sous Le Soleil De Satan centres on the inner conflict of the young, overzealous, rural priest Donisson. Self-flagellating, in a state of constant intense contemplation, he is ready to give himself over to God to cure all the world’s ills. Yet, at the same time, he is torn as to whether he is in fact doing the work of Satan himself.

In a parallel story, we meet Mouchette (Bonnaire), a 16-year-old seductress who has fallen pregnant. Flittering between her various elder lovers, she ends up killing one with a shotgun, and threatens to disgrace the other with the revelation of their affair if he does not help to terminate the pregnancy.

As Donisson sets off to another parish to gain some peace of mind, he experiences visions off the beaten track. He is confronted by Satan himself, before attempting to return to his mentor, only to meet Mouchette at the outskirts of the town. There in this dawn twilight he experiences another vision and tells her life story, her deepest, most vile, secrets, attempting to turn the young girl towards God. The next morning she takes a knife to her throat. Donisson is sent away to a monastery and then is returned to service at another rural parish where his reputation as a saint in modern times is cemented with his resurrection of a dead child...


Anyone who has seen Gérard Depardieu in action knows he is a fine actor who throws himself into his performances, and here his quiet intensity simmers as the young man who is both humbled by his circumstances and desperate to break free. Accentuating this maverick disposition, Donisson is presented as a loose cannon of the order - a McBain of the clergy, if you like. “Inner life today is a battlefield of instincts,” Menou-Segrais warns him, “there’s no room for a saint in such a world, or else he is declared mad.” Further, what could have essentially been the same tale as The Last Temptation Of Christ, albeit without the controversy of having to depict Christ himself as in the throes of Satan’s thrall, is somewhat different – and perhaps braver – than the Scorcese picture, in the way Pialat depicts this spiritual turmoil. The mysticism that imbues the story is presented without any irony, as if such visions are a given in reality, which is refreshing to see in a modern drama. After all, it is usually the curiosity value of such spiritualism that is at the basis of its use in contemporary horror or fantasy, the genres most commonly engaging with such factors today.

However, despite all this, the filmmaking is so uninspiring that Donisson’s trials are rendered prosaic, his torment sedated by the slow pacing and overly didactic screen writing. Unlike many other achievements of adaptation, only near the end of the movie is there any justification given for this cinematic treatment of what may as well have remained as prose. The scene in which Donisson returns life to a dead child is beautifully shot, the dust dancing in the dim light shining naturally, yet directly, upon the waking child. Donisson’s lurching, his yanking, by invisible forces as the film reaches its climax is also an unnerving sight that gives Depardieu his dues, where he has otherwise been smothered by the poor editing and lengthy dialogue.

But while these later scenes give life to the main narrative, the parallel story of Mouchette that punctuates the first hour is consistently brilliant. Bonnaire’s sly seductress is of the Nabokovian variety; sauntering on bare feet somewhere between naivety and manipulation, sweetness and spite. Mouchette is more Margot than Lolita, an intriguing young girl who the viewer is never quite sure of. The scene in which she kills her lover is fantastically rendered. The camera spies her wandering absently over to a table, toying childishly with a shot gun, before falling into deep contemplation with the weapon in her hands. Our eye then leaves the doorway, panning over to her man who walks across the room and through the open door we can no longer see beyond. Angry at her insolence, his rant is stopped dead by the gun blast, off screen, and with Mouchette’s reaction flittering between shock and agony, then cold calculation, we are unsure whether this is murder or manslaughter, cruel revenge or a mistake. It is a shame that Bonnaire’s character does not take up much screen time, as it is with her presence that the film comes alive - her meeting with Depardieu brief yet electric with possibility.


This is an intriguing film in many respects, but is ultimately a sedate rendering of an interesting story. Sous Le Soleil De Satan was apparently booed at Cannes when Pialat received its greatest honour, and while that reaction is perhaps unwarranted, it does seem that the award was, too. JGZ

REVIEW: DVD Release: Seul Contre Tous

Film: Seus Contre Tous
Release date: 19th March 1999

Certificate: 18

Running time: 93 mins

Director: Gaspar Noé

Starring: Philippe Nahon, Blandine Lenoir, Frankie Pain, Martine Audrain, Jean-François Rauger

Genre: Crime/Drama

Studio: Film Office

Format: DVD

Country: France

Gaspar Noe’s debut feature focuses on The Butcher, a character introduced in his short film Carne, in which he murders a man he thinks has raped his retarded daughter – but who had actually only been bloodied by her first period.

In Seul Contre Tous, we follow The Butcher a few months after his release from prison - a lengthy narration explaining how he had returned to Paris to find himself unemployed. Developing a relationship with the manageress of a bar, the action picks up at her mother’s flat where we find the couple have re-located, leaving the city with her promise that she’ll use her saved money to help him set up a new butcher’s shop. Unable to find a location pleasing to his pregnant girlfriend, and patron, The Butcher begins to resent her more than ever, and ends up taking a night job at an old people’s home in order to escape the claustrophobia of their small flat. Comforting a nurse after a traumatic incident on his shift, his girlfriend accuses him of infidelity – at which point he snaps, aborting their child with his repeated pounding of her stomach with his fists.

Taking her mother’s gun, he returns to Paris, with only a few Francs and that steel in his pockets. From here we follow his increasing alienation as his friends turn him away, and he is unable to even get a job working at his former suppliers. Alone with his thoughts, his mind becomes increasingly deranged by revenge fantasies driven by misogyny, homophobia and racism. And for the final act, he decides to reunite with his now teenaged daughter, who had been sent to a home since his incarceration, and who he has since become increasingly infatuated with…


The DVD tagline reads: “If you saw this man walking towards you, you would cross the street. Director Gaspar Noe decides, instead, to take a walk inside his brain.” No kidding! Not only a cool hook to watch the movie, this is a statement of intent. Many scenes are spent watching The Butcher charge with tightly-wound intensity down destitute streets, the camera static, the viewer instead dragged along the murky tides of a consciousness streaming over the images. Dialogue between characters is sparse, but the internal monologue comes gushing like an over-flowing sewer, his tirades against humanity imbued with poetic malevolence. These often stationary shots will surprise many coming to this film on the back of Noe’s later works, in which he has displayed a maverick, and sometimes quite unbelievable, handling of the camera. But the directorial style displayed in this debut, and the low-grade quality of the film stock used is well-suited to the tautness of the script, the inner torment of the character, and the grime of the desolate city through which he rages. And the neat stylistic flourishes that Noe does employ hit even harder for their sporadic use.

As if a reverse of Irreversible, where rumbling frequencies and eternally spinning cameras suddenly stop dead at the pivotal scene, making the rape all the more violent for what would, in other ways, be a less controversial depiction than the eroticised images found elsewhere, here we find moments where the slow pacing suddenly shoots like a bullet. Quite literally – the frames speed up, the camera zooms forward and screams to a halt at the sound of a gunshot ringing out from nowhere. Other stylistic spikes include occasional and unexpected one-note orchestral strikes, jump-cuts that close-in on The Butcher’s ever emptying pockets to transport him between locations, and Noe’s trademark title cards, making their debut here. The most infamous of these being the warning that proceeds the final act: “YOU HAVE 30 SECONDS TO LEAVE THE SCREENING OF THIS FILM.”

This (literal) countdown shares the nihilistic charm that made Tarantino’s early films so intriguing, though the most obvious reference point here is, of course, Scorcese’s Taxi Driver. Like Travis Bickle, The Butcher perceives himself as a lone warrior in streets full of scum, and the homage is made refreshingly obvious with the character’s placing at a porno theatre; at night-duty to deal with his restlessness; his inability to form substantial relationships; and his return to a city that no longer makes any sense to him. But while Scorcese had a young, raffish, Bobby DeNiro as his anti-hero, here Noe makes the quite impressive achievement of employing an actor that is as aesthetically unwelcoming as his internal attitudes – no disrespect to Phillip Nahon, but that tagline really is accurate – yet is still immensely watchable.

A common theme emerging through Noe’s movies is the deranged beauty that greets the end of the violence, sex, and anger, that drives his movies. Irreversible, with its pregnancy (sweet in its sequenced conclusion, horrific in its chronological implication), Enter The Void with the deceased lead’s rebirth (as a child to the sister he incestuously craves), and here we find resolution, or at least dissolution of the rage fuelling the flick, with The Butcher’s revival of his relationship with the mother of the child who left them, through that child she left behind.


Seul Contre Tous is sure to divide viewers between those who wonder why he bothers and those startled by the delivery of his wild visions. But anyone who watches this film will find its images deeply imprinted, long after the screen burns back to static. JGZ