Change Your Image
e-96997
Born May 23, 1970 in Martigny, Switzerland.
An atypical career beginning with drawing from an early age, followed by photography, computer graphics, painting, wood crafts and various disciplines all visual, manual, and all self-taught. Worked mainly as a typographer and projectionist.
By embarking on the path of cinema, he realizes that the skills he has developed cover
the majority of those requested in this trade. Passionate about cinema from the age of 14 when he discovered "Raiders of the lost ark", "The exorcist" and "Alien, the 8th passenger". Later he discovered Hanneke, Fincher, the other films of Friedkin, Kieslowski, Lars von Trier, Michael Mann, Danny Boyle, Christopher Nolan and Denis Villeneuve.
As a solitary and silent child, he invents himself worlds he materializes in his SF and fantasy drawings, where each drawing shows a context and a fraction of history. Later he explore many other kind but mostly personal designs.
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Atomic Blonde (2017)
Blablomic Blonbe
A little messy, a little sexy, a little violent, a little video clipy, a little stylish, a little funny but ultimately a very forgettable film and it's a shame because Charlize Theron is impeccable.
The end of the end is horrible: Haaaa yankee have doubled everyone, haaa our dear Uncle Sam, always the rotten amongs the rotten with a beautiful smile, because with a smile we pass everything.
Kelly & Cal (2014)
Bitersweet, lighly funny, simple and touchaing
An excellent "little" movie.
The story of a friendship between a new mother and a young neighbor in a wheelchair.
The trailer gives a much brighter image than it actually is. And it's better than the trailer. It gives a bittersweet atmosphere all along that takes guts. A film that speaks to young parents, first love, the passing of time, the mourning to do.
Simple and touching.
Prometheus (2012)
A thing without soul and logic characters actions
Very short text on this film. There are tons of things to say but even after multiple visions, the impression of quality is only diminished each time. So why spend time on it?
Why is "Prometheus" a big disappointment with the quality of the 1st Alien by the same Ridley Scott?
When we look at the making of the film, we see that their goal was to give answers to the unexplained things of the first. What is also a quality in a film, because it gives the viewer something to question.
The problem is that they have put these unresolved questions on the table and have randomly arranged the answers, which gives this fuzzy scenario and makes it indigestible. They focused on giving answers instead of creating an original, engaging story that makes us tickle with the characters.
Result: a soulless and harmless film with which one can always theorize and explain the semi-proven infos. But this is only the mind walking its way in a labyrinth. A good film transports us, raises us and feeds us, including a thriller. This film encloses us in a wriggle whose answer is without interest. The goal being ambitious: the origins of life. But at no time did I feel the slightest chill on this subject. A tortuous story and irrational characters prevent any involvement.
This contrasts so much with the immense qualities of Alien the 8th passenger, a scenario that has passed through many hands and which in its time was innovative, that makes it dizzy.
The Revenant (2015)
A ghost film about a revenant, a double miss
Let's say it, this film is one of the Oscar-flop of 2016. Beautiful object, by an excellent filmmaker, but for once has planted. The Academy (and others) did not see anything.
The immediate impression is very positive. The photography is spectacular, costumes, makeup perfect (it's like) and the physical commitment of all the actors is impressive. The rhythm is slow, the plans are long and fluid. The story ... that's where it gets stuck.
This film is gold wrapping that wraps a bronze medal (it could have been chocolate)
I think Father Iñárritu got lost in his technical performance and the intensity of the context of his shooting.
After the very successful Birdman, who already put in play a technical challenge (very long shots) but was touching and fascinating by his scenario, his characters and this subtle game between the theatrical form and cinematograph, here he adds a technical layer but forget about everything else.
Because for the form, it is difficult to do better. Mainly thanks to the shooting locations and the magic of the weather phenomena. Magic that made several team members left the shoot because of the difficult conditions.
Here too we are dealing with long, very smooth shots, but because there is a but, this process is not ideal in all situations. And not all the time. The specificity of cinema is the succession of different points of view. The transition from one plane to another is an alchemy that creates our emotional involvement. A little like the chemistry that makes it possible to obtain a 3rd ingredient from the two completely different 1sts, the assembly makes it possible to create a sensation which is born from this succession of different images. Here this process involves us in what is happening on the screen (being a witness continuously of everything that happens) but curiously I found that it prevented me at the same time from entering the heart Of the history. I floated around the characters and in these snow-covered forests but I was not there.
I think that's where the technical process became its own justification and no longer a way of telling the story. Each day of shooting, the whole team repeated (blocking) these very complicated plans and at the end of the day, they had about 1 h 30 to turn the shots or plans. That's probably what made the filming so hard and long. A system to be able to say that one kept his line, that one preserved an artistic integrity.
Unfortunately, when a method becomes its own raison d'être, it condemns the purpose of the company: tell a story, make us live emotions.
There are several moments when wow have it in his head, but the heart is not there. Because the story is very linear and does not carry major issues. For short, it comes down to: argument, left for dead, survival, revenge, end.
During each of these stages, few moral questions are raised. There are some, but they remain confined to the facts presented. We leave the wounded man to his fate: but he is still alive, yes, but the Indians are coming. That kind. For a good part of the movie, DiCaprio struggles like hell. This kind of experience forces the one who lives it to make profound changes, such as during a pilgrimage. Here (almost) nothing. The character advances, survives, fights but nothing lets feel that he really lives the situation. Probably because the process (yet): paste a wide-angle lens on the nose of the actors imposes a way of seeing things that does not necessarily stick with what we tell. The system becomes its own disadvantage and kills what has spawned it.
We are very far from Seul au Monde, with Tom Hanks, where we feel transformed over the course of his adventure. I was infinitely more excited when I saw The Gray with Liam Neeson. Same context, the Indians in less, the soul and more,
The physical commitment of the actor is admirable but that's not what makes you vibrate. There are indeed some effects of style (appearances of his wife and son - adoptive) but which are only dreams, visions. They show us what he lost.
Painful detail that must be taken into account before seeing this film: its masochism. The number of sufferings through which the protagonist goes is such that it made me think of Mel Gibson's Passion. 2 hours of whipping. Here it is a little that, more varied. Such a martyr is almost survivalist pornography.
All this for what? A story of revenge. History of fat and cruel colonists.
Iñárritu has offered us some sumptuous films like 21 Grams or Babel. But here, the shell is empty, because I do not see what can be removed. Even the best filmmakers can crash. Iñárritu often talks about the ego in his interviews. And in general, it is people who have trouble getting rid of it who talk about it the most. I think he got himself here.
This film has the form of a work of art but does not have the substance. Its shape is reminiscent of Terrence Malick's films except that it is sorely lacking in sensitivity. Malick (in The Tree of Life for example) shows a succession of moments of life, without necessarily linking them by a dramatic plot, but everything digs in us and throughout the film, we are brought into this state that makes the films so wonderful sometimes. Here we live viscerally events (which is already not bad) but nothing "hollow".
We could make a musical analogy: this film is a bit like the last albums of the Dream Theater group. Formerly the spearhead of progressive hard-rock inventive, sensitive and technically very high level. Today they play their own farce, flowing in an infinite complexity but without soul.
In view of the beauty of the film's photography, the intensity of the actors' play (should they overplay for that to be seen behind their hair and their disheveled beard? Or is it to compensate for the emptiness of the characters?) and its slow form, it is easy to believe in a great movie. Iñárritu probably believes it. To believe is not to be.
In any case, I did not find what makes me go sit in a dark room.
I bet in a little while, nobody will talk about this movie anymore. Only time reveals what's true and what's not.
Steve Jobs (2015)
Danny Boyle is a quiet genius
In 1 word, fan-tas-tic!
Forget the consensus biopic of 2013. Boyle's film here, whose only (relative) defect is to be released after, is infinitely superior at all levels.
Cinephiles, comedians known or not, go see it. This is a real movie of comedians. It takes place in 3 acts, each shot on 3 different media: 16 mm film, 35 mm film and digital. During the shooting, before each act the actors repeated for 1 week and then turned the act, stop, repetition and so on. Filmed in 3 different theaters, still indoors, it revolves around the two main characters (Jobs and its marketing director). Splendid work (we will say "as usual") of Fassbender and Winslet, and all the supporting roles.
The film keeps us in suspense for 2 hours at the sole strength of the actors and the quality of the dialogues fairly dense. A little technical but not that much.
It's not a movie about the Mac. It shows (in each of the acts) Jobs before each product launch, you know those technological masses that made Apple-addicts vibrate. Each act ends when Jobs enters the scene.
It shows the story of the successes and failures of Jobs, its conflicts with its employees, its partners (Wozniak) and its bosses. And especially paternity with his daughter, he refuses to recognize at first. It is in this relationship that is difficult to weave which emerges the humanity of the film, which could have been a long blah-blah without soul. Failure avoided brilliantly because the narration is dynamic. Included in the text but without the context of the adventure Apple.
The music is discreet, it is limited to regular and repetitive layers, never too present. It is only there to insinuate a subtle but effective tension when it is necessary. The characters are complex, human, diverse. Nothing manichean here.
Facing film, we can draw parallels with "The Social Network" David Fincher, the story of Facebook. Shiny film too but here Boyle offers us more sensitivity to humans, to what he lives. The relationship between Jobs and her daughter is as touching as possible, because it develops despite the rough personality of Jobs, and flourishes only at the end, without artifice, without violins, without big accolades, without tears. And it's all the more moving.
12 Angry Men (1997)
A rare thing to do better than the original
January 3, 2017 - There are movies that remind you why you love movies.
The deliberations of a jury in the case of a homicide: a young man with a difficult course is accused of the murder of his violent father. From the beginning, the case seems clear: the son is guilty because everything accuses him. A first round of voting is requested. All vote "guilty" except one man.
Thus begins a discussion of one hour and fifty which will reveal the reasons for the act, the unresolved issues of the investigation, the various motives of the members of the jury. Everything happens, everything explodes because of a single individual who did not say "guilty". A man who wanted to know more, because he was not convinced in his soul and conscience of the guilt of the young man.
As simple as it is, 12 Angry Men is an exceptional story, which tells so much about the human, his social relationships, his relationship to the truth, what he believes to be the truth, the interference of personal experiences in his perceptions and on the strength of doubt and dialogue.
The 1997 version by William Friedkin (The Exorcist, French Connection, Sorcerer, To Live and Die in LA, ...) is splendid. 2 hours of dialogue in a closed room that keeps you in suspense, you have to do it. The plot focuses on the arguments and gives no conclusion as to the guilt or otherwise of the accused. It's very strong because the point of view of the film is precisely what is said about the act, and not its nature.
January 12, 2017 - I just saw the 1957 version of Sydney Lumet with the splendid Henry Fonda.
Surprised: I find that the version of William Friedkin of 1997 is better than that of 1957. Longer than 20 minutes, better staged, better characters, the tension is more palpable. But seeing the one from 1957, I remember that I clearly felt the progress of the tension thanks to the very subtle work of Friedkin's camera.
If you look at it (look at it!), Observe when it is tight or wide, when it moves the camera or not and how the Fa4on to show the scene influences the emotional intensity. I just saw it for the fourth time in 6 months and I do not get tired.
It reminds me that this great director and not known assz has made a better remake of another classic, the Salary of Fear. His version is called in French The Convoy of Fear (or Sorcerer in VO) and it is extraordinary. Re-released on DVD / Blu-Ray recently thanks to its status of cult film.
Decidedly this guy is an unknown genius. He has to his credit a flop of intriguing and sometimes disturbing films.
Praise of doubt: faced with 11 certainties, 1 man gives a doubt and that will save the accused. Jack Lemmon, the ordinary and modest man who said no.
This story seems to me very important in our time when the media is on the alert because of the explosion of information sharing methods. We must more than ever be cautious when appearances, labels, reputations.
We must never believe, we must examine, always.
- Alain -