Une journée bien remplie ou Neuf meurtres insolites dans une même journée par un seul homme dont ce n'est pas le métier

Jean-Louis Trintignant steps behind the camera and writes and directs this black comedy about a man who sets out to kill the 9 jurors who sent his son to death row in the space of a single day. The deaths are all different and intricately staged, so the film is basically about watching them play out. In that regard, it's virtually a silent film. It's interesting, but I found it to be strangely uninvolving. It's like watching an intricate little machine that you have no interest in.

Or maybe influenced by THEATER OF BLOOD or THE ABOMINABLE DR PHIBES, in terms of scheme, topic, vengeance of a father to avenge the death of his son - himself a murderer - who was sentenced and executed by the justice after a trial. So it is a weird, offbeat, story, in the Jean Pierre Mocky's style, as f...of as will be LE MAITRE NAGEUR, a few years later, directed by the same Jean Louis Trintignant. I have been puzzled - and still am - by the meaning of both films, especially from some one like Trintignant. I would have expected something more sensitive, poignant, some kind of drama, character study, instead of this sort of joke. Yes, I am puzzled, but not deceived. This is exceptional, it announces Gustave de Kervern's world, starring Yolande Moreau and the new old version of Gerard Depardieu.

I think I have seen this movie as a boy, as it was released, and, later on TV, many years after. It is astounding. A precursor of many trends which would be apparent and more commonplace two decades later. For example, the opening scene: the first victim is killed at a car wrecking lot with a violence and detachment reminiscent of a Tarantino movie.

Amazing soundtrack - which gets intertwined with the actual story of the movie when a piece is announced as "the hunter" on the radio of the vehicle of one of the last victims, a hunter himself. Makes you think that both victim and assassin are hearing it and gets you emotionally in the middle of the action, sharing the raw fear and excitement of the only victim who is forewarned of the threat and at least has the means to fight back. The main title is an unforgettable tune which stays with you much after you finished watching.

A road movie - using all the most improbable means of transportation and amazingly minimalist but effective stunt driving (I was not aware of Trintignant being the director and writer until I saw the file on IMDb - which would explain mastery of this aspect of the movie...).

What amazed me most was that even when you know why the apparently innocuous baker - a fantastic Jacques Dufilho - kills with no signs of remorse whatsoever all of those people, one finds himself in his shoes and becomes convinced that his was truly "Une journée bien remplie" - a well spent day. And anticipates (with a sarcastic grin) the one that grandpa Rousseau will soon spend too....

What a crazy film! Writer/Director Jean-Louis Trintignant clearly enjoyed himself here. There is barely a scene that does not scream with glee at the sheer audacity and anarchic inevitability as the remarkable Jacques Dufilho utterly convinces as a man with a mission. And what a mission- to kill nine people in as imaginative ways as possible and there is method in his madness. Apart from the mad story we have the most amazing visuals and in this marvellous mix of Alejandro Jodorowsky and Jacques Tati, a wondrous black comedy that constantly startles and surprises. Possibly a little stretched, always a problem for a one idea film but something very different and well worth a watch. Bruno Nicolai also most effective, especially when it creeps into the screenplay with a reference on the radio in the car of a man about to die.

Jean Rousseau is traveling around France with his mother in his side-car. He kills individuals in unusual ways and shows his victims a picture of a chubby young man. It turns out that the victims are the nine jury members who convicted his son to a death sentence.

It's an interesting French-Italian black comedy. I just didn't find it compelling. It needs some dialogue especially between Jean and his mother. That's the missed opportunity. It needs some back and forth. They could be bickering. They need to be funny. Some of the kills are fun. It's a really interesting idea, but it's missing the writing.