Bâton Rouge

Bad, story, bad direction, bad acting. It is about 3 French youg jobless guys who go to America to strike it rich, do not make it and start a fast food business in the project. It is cliches, after cliches, after cliches. Boring ! I had to zap in fast forward through the second half.

I am a Parisian too and watched that movie when it came out, back in 1985. I was then 22 and bored to live in Paris. Yes living in Paris is not always a dream, you have to deal with the bad weather, the noise, the pollution and more, the lack of opportunity.

I remember watching Canal+ (the first private channel in France), it was a late evening. I had no idea of what "Baton Rouge" was all about. Actually "Baton Rouge" means "red stick" in French, I had no clue that Baton Rouge was a major city in Louisiana.

My eyes were wide open and this movie alone made me want to move to the US and live the American dream too. I enjoyed every bit of this true story based movie.

After that, my whole life was going to change. It took me 3 years to accomplish what seemed to be for me at the time, the impossible: I moved to the US. Like in the movie, it was not simple and I had to be quite creative too.

I have now been living in California for 19 years. A few years ago I went to Baton Rouge to see it for myself. I did not really like Louisiana but I went there because of the movie.

Now, I'll give anything to own a copy of the movie. Mr producer, I thank you for creating with this movie a dream big enough so it changed my entire life and forced me to make it happen.

I highly recommend this movie to my fellow Parisians...