Nach dem Leben

Après la vie is a part of a very interesting cinematographic experiment. The other parts are two other films made by Lucas Belvaux: Un couple épatant and Cavale. The three films are set in the same city (Grenoble in the French Alps) during the same period of time and share the same roles. The point is, in each of the three movies the focus is on different people. The leading actors in one movie are the supporting actors in another one, and vice versa. Some scenes in the movies are exactly the same, some are the same but filmed from a different viewpoint, and most scenes are unique to one of the three movies. Belvaux has chosen three different genres: a comedy (Un couple épatant), a drama (Après la vie) and a thriller (Cavale).

So far, so good. The experiment works: after seeing all three of the films, a fourth imaginary film emerges in which all the different pieces of the puzzle come together. There is only one little problem: not all three films are good. The comedy is not very funny, the thriller is not very thrilling, and only the drama is in a way dramatic. I found Après la vie (about a cop who has to become corrupt because he needs dope for his drug-addicted wife) by far the best one out of the three. But perhaps this is because I saw this movie after the other two and knew the story already more or less. Cavale was the first one I saw and, to be honest, I had trouble understanding everything that happened (although a friend I saw the movie with had no trouble at all). But perhaps this is an inevitable consequence of the experiment. So if you want to enjoy an unusual experiment, go see all three movies. If you think that takes too much time and costs too much money, go see Après la vie - a decent drama - and forget about the other two. Unless you want to admire the breathtaking beauty of Ornella Muti: then Un couple épatant is your best choice because she has a leading role in this movie.

I loved these three films - trilogy - as I discovered it back thirteen years ago. I loved the scheme, this symmetry existing between those three features, the scheme where a main character in one movie becomes a supporting one in the following one. This scheme reminds me Nicolas Winding Refn's PUSHER trilogy. The stories are not the same as in this trilogy, but the way of frame, structure of those tales is exactly the same. And so unusual too. I am surprised that no one has pointed it out yet. As far as I know, I have not watched such way of telling in any other trilogies. New ways of screen writing are very hard to make, I guess. They prefer the PULP FICTION one or those many movies where several fates collide between the characters. Lucas Belvaux is not a pretty good actor, his way of acting is not convincing at all, but as a director, he's different. He always gives us very interesting films.

In comparison to "An Amazing Couple", this film has a different texture, as it deals with the realities of drug addiction. The director inserts scenes from the previous film, as we get to see why things happened the way they did in the second installment of this trilogy.

It is incredible to think Agnes, very nicely played by Dominique Blanc, has been able to maintain her drug problem for more than 20 years and still keep her job at the local high school where she teaches. Now we know: her husband Pascal, a detective, keeps her supplied with drugs he takes from junkies and dealers. Pascal is Agnes worst enemy because being afraid to lose her, he maintains also a double life; not only does he not help the woman he loves, but breaks the law in the process.

It is even more incredible when we see road blocks where people are checked for possible drug dealing in the school where Agnes teach and where another teacher is interrogated about the drug problem in that particular school. In many ways this film is an eye opening in knowing to what extent drugs are prevalent in today's society, be it in Europe, or the United States.

Some of the material doesn't work very well. There are many unanswered questions in this whole mess. The best thing for the film are Gilbert Melki, as the detective that is willing to break the law and Dominique Blanc, as the tormented Agnes.

The problem of drug addiction is even worse today than 15 years ago when Lucas Belvaux's film was released, and unfortunately he adds little to nothing here.

An attempt at a different approach fails miserably, as the first half of the 2-hour feature is deadly dull - a combination of police procedural and domestic drama. Gilbert is a corrupt cop and he plays the role blankly: all we know about the poker-faced, handsome guy (should have been cast as a gangster instead) is he babies his teacher wife Dominique Blanc in her addiction to morphine (which he acquires illegally through his job) and he is attracted to her friend Ornella Muti (duh!, who wouldn't be?).

Blanc's underplaying for nearly an hour is wearying, until in the second half the script turns from kitchen sink dreariness to overheated melodramatic outbursts, thoroughly unconvincing. Tying up the case he's working on with his wife's predicament is a ridiculous "neat" script ploy, and Belvaux himself intrudes in the nothing role of the arch villain of the piece, played flatly by him.

What this proves is that even a serious approach by a serious filmmaker can end up as routine and pointless as any exploitation film about oft- exploited subject matter. I much prefer the extremes of the genre, namely "Christiane F." on the docu-style well-meaning end of the spectrum, or a good, old-fashioned sexploitation approach at the other.

"On the Run (Cavale)" is the first third of an engrossing experiment in story telling that crosses "Rashomon" with a television miniseries to show us an ensemble of intersecting characters over a couple of days to gradually reveal the complicated truth about each.

Writer/director Lucas Belvaux uses a clever technique to communicate just how differently the characters perceive the same situations-- they are literally in different movies and, a la "Rules of the Game," everyone has their reasons.

"On the Run"is a tense, fast-paced escaped con on-the-run Raoul Walsh-feeling film, with the auteur himself playing a Humphrey Bogart-type who can be cruel or kind; "An Amazing Couple (Un couple épatant)" is an Ernest Lubitch-inspired laugh-out-loud comedy of mistaken communication; and "After the Life (Après la vie)" is a Sidney Lumet-feeling gritty, conflicted cop melodrama with seamy and tender moments.

"Time Code" experimented turning the two-dimensions of film into three with multiple digital video screens. This trilogy is more effective in showing us what happens as characters leave the frame. Belvaux goes beyond the techniques used in the cancelled TV series "Boomtown" or the films of Alejandro González Iñárritu in "Amores Perros" and "21 Grams" with their stream-of-consciousness flashbacks character by character.

I don't see how I can deal with each film separately. Theoretically, one can see the three movies alone or independently out of order, but that would be like watching one episode of a series like "The Wire" or "The Sopranos" and wondering what the big deal is. Only a handful of patrons in my theater joined me in a one-day triple-feature; I guess the others have a better memory than I do that they could see each film on separate days, though a marathon does inevitably lead to some mind-wandering that could miss important clues and revelations so this is ideal for a triple-packed DVD.

On DVD we'll be able to replay the excellent acting to see if in fact the actors do shade their performances differently when particular scenes are enacted from different characters' viewpoints -- are these takes from the same staging or not? How is each subtly different that we get a different impression each time? Or are we bringing our increasing knowledge (and constantly changing sympathies) about each character to our impressions of the repeating scenes?

One reason this conceit works is because of the unifying theme of obsession - each character is so completely single-minded in their focus on one issue that they are blind to what else is happening even as they evolve to find catharsis. One is literally a heroin addict, but each has their psychological addiction (revenge, co-dependence, hypochondria, jealousy).

The slow revelation technique also works because of the parallel theme of aging and acceptance of the consequences of their actions, as some can face how they have changed and some can't change. You need to see all three films to learn about each character's past and conclusion, as secondary characters in one film are thrust to the fore in another in explaining a key piece of motivation.

The only place they really interchange is in an ironically, meaningless political debate at the public high school they each have some tie to.