Saint-Narcisse

The nature seems be the main virtue of this film. Far to be a bad one, it seems too ambitious, reuniting, mixing different themes in eccentric manner, offering a ball of cliches and eccentric fantasies, suggesting improvisation and exploring, in not the most smart manner, old cliches, from Narcisse to Saint Sebastian significance in gay sub culture.

Sure, beautiful details, nice references to classic stories, not uninspired - forced in few scenes - links between erotic and horror. And, no doubts, interesting work of Tania Kontoyanni, not bad try to define his characters - and the seductive body - of Felix Antoine Duval.

So, I admitt, it is not fair or easy to be very critic about this film for me. Sure, not perfect, not brilliant acting but, as admirer of Gothic culture - the thoughts about The Monk by Matthew Gregory Lewis are the first- , Saint Narcisse is more than decent.

...he might have made a movie like this.

I seriously wish I had done a couple bong hits or shots before watching this. Some of the dialogue might have been more tolerable, or the incomprehensible changes in character motivation might have made sense. It's a pretty twisted tale to start with, but slow pacing and plodding developments don't help. When a movie is only 1 hr 40 minutes, but feels like 3 and a half hours, it's a warning that things are not right.

I know it's supposed to be "edgy" and "shocking", but when it's also so dull that the delicious male nudity barely wakes you up you realize you're strapped in for a rough ride.

Let me start by saying that I try to be kind in my reviews. I really do. This is not a kind review. This is the worst thing I've ever seen. Even before the plot line (which I'll get to), it's not good. The camerawork is choppy and uneven and the acting is either really good or really bad, but not consistent. The soundtrack has more of a horror vibe and I was never sure if characters were mentally ill or if it really was just super weird.

Now for the plot. This is something that looks like it was made to prove that gay people are mentally ill and are coming for everyone else. The end could've been an excellent point about recovering from religious trauma, but instead they went a whole other direction.

It's not even so bad it's good. It's just bad.

I'm not sure what to make of this. At times it seems like it wants to be a serious minded film. Other times it seems close to soft porn. The exterior shots are well photographed, but the acting is dismal, though the lead, Félix-Antoine Duval, has charisma and is certainly sexy to make up for his acting deficiency. He sounds dubbed, but he's not. In any event, this is a poorly written film, to put it mildly, but somehow hard to turn off as you cannot help but wonder what will happen next. I fear that makes it sound more interesting than it is. The last scene is laughable.

The queer artist Bruce LaBruce has done some entertainment films like The Raspberry Reich, and his movies are often kind of camp where he mixes classical film stereotypes with clichés from gay porn. This film is camp as well, but it feels like it was not intentional. Cause I think that we are supposed to take this story seriously. It feels like an attempt to look cinematic where the director tries to frame the pictures perfectly but doesn't manage to do this as the way it was intended. The script could need an extra rewrite, and I like the promise of the twin brother who meets and catch desire for each other and the mythology of Narcissus.

The movie's sound is kind of a disaster, they seem to have dubbed several scenes after, especially scenes outside, and they sound like they are in a basement, and there is zero engagement in the tones from the actors. Also, the sound effects sound like they are picked from an old cartoon, which isn't helping if the intention was to make the film feel serious.

The material the actors have to work with is not great, but it isn't helping that they are not the best actors either. A great actor can deliver even if they are working with a script that isn't that good.

This film has been described as being controversial, my biggest issue was to keep my focus on the film, and I was checking my watch to see how long that was left. Bruce LaBruce might be relevant two decades ago and have been essential for the queer art cinema, but this film shows that he has stagnation in his artwork, and it hasn't been any progress since then. Luckily it has been for queer cinema as a whole, so there are much better films to watch today.