Un couteau dans le cœur

Sitges Film Festival Review

Story, Setting, Characters, Mood etc. are all pretty cool on paper. I think the pure script of the movie is pretty awesome. Sadly the version shown at the Sitges Film Festival did not manage to put these elements together as one flowing film. It felt unfinished in many aspects. The heart is at the very right place. But the execution did not do it justice.

Imagine "Stranger By the Lake" directed by Dario Argento or better still, Claire Denis and you're about a quarter of the way there. "Knife+Heart" is a deliciously giddy piece of gay giallo, partly "Cruising", partly "Dressed to Kill" and yet feeling totally original. Anne, (an excellent Vanessa Paradis), is a producer of gay male porn whose actors suddenly keep getting murdered in particularly nasty ways. Rather than initially shedding tears, Anne turns the killings into a movie she calls 'Homocidal'.



Naturally it's gruesome but it's also as stylish and as gorgeous as anything DePalma might have done and director Yann Gonzalez is bold enough to take the clichés of the genre, (thunderstorms, a black crow to herald the murders), and turn them on their head; you are never quite sure which way he's heading. Even the sexual make-up of his characters is never clearly defined. This is a really smart take on a genre we thought we knew inside out; once upon a time we would have called it 'post-modern' but don't let that put you off. It's set in 1979 and fans of giallo from that period will find much to enjoy here just as anyone interested in New Queer Cinema will also find much to relish...oh, and don't leave until the very last image leaves the screen

Cultural stereotypes abound in this test of patience from France, acted so broadly that it makes the Three Stooges look subtle. Vanessa Paradis is charming in her own way, but she can't carry this poorly-composed dumpster fire, even if it is beautifully-shot and has a gorgeous soundtrack from M83.

Make no mistake: this is a movie more about a failed lesbian love affair than it is anything else, and it's about as enjoyable as watching a series of hate crimes. Which is to say, not at all. It's unforgivably boring, and for a French film and a film dealing with gay pornography as a focus, it's also terrified of actually committing to the topic. There's barely any nudity to speak of, and certainly nothing surprising or even approaching shocking. If you're going to make a lurid horror film about a violent killer in the very sketchy territory of porn production -- especially gay porn -- you have to actually commit to it. Real giallo didn't exactly shy away from nudity or sex and, even if most of the movies weren't much count, they at least could keep an audience engaged with things happening, whether or not they led to a satisfying conclusion.

But speaking as a gay man and someone who has seen quite a lot of both French cinema and gay cinema (not to mention giallo), this was less than mediocre at best and incredibly offensive at worst. All in all, it's boring, and that's one of the worst things something supposed to entertain can be. Inane, pretentious, unhappy, unentertaining, unamusing, and incredibly superficial -- that's this movie. When it's at its lowest, it comes off as a homophobic parade of poorly-written and poorly-realized nonsense. When it's at its best, it relies on visuals and score...which makes the story pointless.

It's a shame, since the same director also did You And The Night, which was a fantastic film. You And The Night worked because it was a fantasy, with a tremendous magic to the thread of its story, and its at-times incoherent quality seemed dreamlike and engaging. It's a much better choice to watch than this turd, and it's also given a soundtrack by the brilliant M83. Watch it instead.

I really wanted to like this movie, especially based on the reviews, but it just bored me to tears. I just stopped after half way through and read the synopsis to find out what happened. Glad I stopped... completely unoriginal and yawn-inducing.

It started strong. I like how you, as the viewer, were pulled into the film's world. I was hoping that the first death would be the only Argento-style moment. Unfortunately, the tone of the rest just made me feel like I was watching another of the many films I've watched in the past. I wasn't expecting jump scares...just something new or original (somewhat).

I'm usually really forgiving of movies. I don't have superior taste or have high standards. I just want to be entertained and to be told a story. But, I do want something a tad original and fresh. I just didn't feel anything about this was original or fresh. It's bad, in my opinion, when I'd just rather read the synopsis rather than finish.

I usually give movies that are "meh" or "aiight" a 5. If you're at a 4, it means you fell below that to "not the worst, but I don't want to watch again..."

I'm not saying skip it. Just know what you're getting into before you watch. See the other non-spoiler reviews to see if it's your cup. If it sounds too familiar, and you need something new, then just simply move along. There are a ton of movies (especially French movies) that have great stories....horror or otherwise.

The word giallo is thrown around in a lot of the reviews here - and not least of which in the description on MUBI - but it strikes me that Yann Gonzalez isn't necessarily all that interested in getting some shocks or indulging so much in the kill set pieces (not that he doesn't completely, with one involving lots of 360 degree pans revealing in each succession the killer approaching and then slicing away) as much as he is in pushing the colors that hes working with and mixing film stocks and, in his way, doing a meta comment on using art as a way to fight back.

When Vanessa Paradis's Anne goes to a police station to be briefly questioned about one of her actors being offed, this is then cut away to her recreating this with her own actors (Anal Fury 5 quickly becomes "Homocidal," the best pun you never thought of because why would you), and when she thinks she can draw out who may be the killer, she quickly stages a scene of sado-masochism... And gets what she is asking for (in the one scene that is truly suspenseful). What I'm trying to say here is that if you go in to Knife+Heart expecting a usual Argento or Fulci or one of those directors, you'll be not so much disappointed as thrown off.

And yes, MUBI, it is "unapologetically queer", which, you know, good. But it is also unapologetically French: the Italians had their own method of madness when it came to drawing out violent and/or surreal set pieces (one commonality is a lush and vibrant and spine-tingling score), and this has some surrealism as well, like with the black and white 16mm that feels like it's deliberately cut in from another movie.

But it also embraces and in fact demands that it be erotic and push the limits (albeit no actual genitals are seen, they might as well be), and Gonzalez is in love with color in a particular way. When we see red, it feels especially red and fiery; when we see blue, it's particularly somber and sad. And black? Well, that's the name of the game, man/woman - darkness is all around these characters, but what I also find striking is that, for the types the gay actors and some crew are, they feel like real people, which I often didn't get from Italian Giallos.

One issue though is that it is a director preferring style over substance. He loves Paradis clearly and what she can bring, but her role is thin and I never really felt for her (though she is, without spoiling, denied her moment of redemption that should come). Maybe that makes her more tragic, but I just didn't feel it, and that is what also is more French to me than anything - the sense of doomed romance and ennui which... Cool. But it's definitely more of a visual and sensory experience than one for story or real pathos.