Canicule

Canicule appears to be an attempt to portray all of humanity as depraved, degraded or, perhaps more aptly: dégueulasse. It never lets up and every single character is simply horrible. The scenes of the wheat fields are gorgeous but the rest is as dirty as dirty gets. I suspect that everyone involved in this production came to regret having helped to make this thing a thing. If you like hyperviolent films, you might delight in this one. Otherwise, I'd advise staying away.

Not to be underestimated, this French black comedy of sorts stars Marvin in one of his last film roles as a fugitive bank robber, but he's really more of a plot device to showcase the crazy antics of his French co-stars, each with their own offbeat characterisation proving more dangerous than Marvin himself.

Lovely Miou-Miou is the film's leading lady, a captive farming wife of an abusive husband (Lanoux) who sees Marvin as her opportunity for emancipation. Man-child Bennent is a highlight playing a smart-mouthed inbred kid, himself a victim of the Lanoux character's rough handedness who clues onto Marvin's gambit from the outset, setting himself up as the hero of the ensuing farce making for a satisfying climax.

Also grabbing the attention is Bernadette Lafont playing one of the toothless farmhouse occupants with a comically lubricious lust for carnality. Virtually the entire cast play a whacky assortment of oddballs, offset (ironically) by Marvin as the only predictable character in the plot. Apart from Marvin, the only other native English-speaker in the cast is Tina Louise in a small supporting role as one of Marvin's accomplices during the opening heist.

Well photographed with sharp dialogue, a catchy bass guitar sound and overall sympathetic characters, 'Dog Day' might be an unknown quantity for most casual Marvin fans, but is surely worth a look if you're open-minded to a bit of depraved French farmhouse farce.

Although I haven't seen every one of his movies, I am reasonably confident to call "Dog Day" the strangest movie Lee Marvin ever appeared in. Why he decided to appear in it, I have no idea, especially since he was still a big star back home in the United States. Fans of Marvin will likely be disappointed by the fact that Marvin doesn't appear in this movie as frequently as he does in his other movies - in fact, he almost becomes a secondary character. The other characters in the movie are a real weird lot, disappearing and reappearing seemingly at random, and acting in random ways when they do appear. Certainly, the movie at first does command your attention because you've likely not seen anything like it before, but it soon becomes tiresome, and you likely won't care what happens at the end when it eventually gets there.

I was browsing the reviews for this before I saw it and noticed the negative comments and low ratings. Unfortunately many reviewers were giving the key moments of the plot away without warning. When I watched it, in French I thought it was a superb black comedy. Not as stylish as a Tarantino film but actually much better in substance. Lee Marvin does an amazing job doing his own lines in French. I was wondering why the others had found the film risible and upon investigation I found the American dubbed version streaming, which IS risible. People should understand that to do justice to this film, an English language version would cost almost as much as the original film and is well nigh impossible. American dubs of Franco-Italian cinema are hardly ever worth watching. Even if you don't understand French, the subtitles plus the music of the delivery, the intonations, are enough to experience the original. I don't know how easily you can find a French language version with good English subtitles though.

This is essentially a trash film that luckily does not take itself too seriously. It is well aware of its nature as entertainment and uses themes familiar from such films as "Deliverance" and "The Hills Have Eyes" in a sort of parodic context.

It features a family living in rural France where the father is a brutal and violent pervert, his brother is same but worse, the son (about 10) is following on the same track and the father's sister is a nympho. Key in lots of tasteless moments (the clubbering to death of two Swedish (topless) campers, the suicide of the grandmother when they threaten to take her to old folks' home, the spending spree of the 10 year old kid in a cathouse and so on)and what you have is a fairly entertaining exploitation picture with a European touch.

You know whether you'll like it or not! Definitely not for the fans of Lee Marvin...