The Villain (2009)
With gun-toting rivals on his tail, a daring bank robber takes refuge in the quiet residential street here he grew up and where his mother, Maniette, still lives. An unscrupulous property developer, Korazy, is buying up the neighborhood to turn it into a gleaming new banking district, but to her son's disgust Maniette leads the inhabitants resistance. Her ingenious methods provoke her boy's admiration, but he fights back with sneaky traps and underhand tricks when Maniette tries to force him to do the right thing just once in his life.
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The Worst Film Ever
It is a performances centric movie
In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.
Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.
This film brings together two of the most versatile actors in French cinema and whilst Catherine Frot has often displayed her gift for comedy this is the first time I have been exposed to Albert Dupontel's lighter side which isn't of course to say he has never appeared in comedy just that I haven't seen him. He wrote and directed this black comedy himself in which he plays a really bad seed who has been in trouble since his childhood. Having left home twenty years ago and not bothered to keep in touch with his mother, Catherine Frot, he only returns now because he is on the lam from fellow criminals he has managed to upset. He is reunited with a mother who has troubles of her own, holding out against unscrupulous property developers who are buying up the residential neighborhood for commercial development. After a series of inventive-to-brilliant sight gags and sharp dialogue involving both mother and son getting shot it ends on an upbeat not. It's not going to trouble the Cesar judges but it is highly enjoyable.