La merditude des choses

I know one shouldn't mix reviews with personal experiences, but when watching this film I couldn't help but constantly remember an anecdote that happened to me one New Year's morning in Brussels: trying to cure my party hangover with some friends in a bar, we observed a guy trying to cross the street with a crate of beer. Now the streets were all frozen over and the king had advised in his New Year's address to stay at home. Plus the roads in Brussels are caved in by traffic. So the weight of the crate kept the guy sliding towards the middle of the street. He could make it to either side without, but not with the crate. Nevertheless, he kept trying for over an hour to pull, shove or otherwise move the crate from where it was stuck - until he found the ingenious solution: He drank six bottles of beer on the spot, thereby sufficiently reducing the weight to pull the crate over - only that he got so drunk and spaced out in the process that he slipped and broke all of the bottles, so his whole effort came to naught.

This little story has nothing and everything to do with 'Misfortunates' which is chock full of incidents like this one. And as abundant films about losers and social misfits may be in Belgian/ Dutch cinema (like Aaltra, The Sexual Life of Belgians, Flodders, Spetters), this one takes the cake in every respect: the autobiographical story is perfectly adapted and wonderfully played. Its provides tons of utterly irrelevant, but amusing add-ons like when the Strubbes invite themselves over to an exiled Iranian couple to force them into watching a Roy Orbison concert because their TV's been repossessed. Like in my little story, one cannot help but somewhat admire the persistence of the Strubbe family to make their lives as dysfunctional as humanly possible, while one cannot ignore the destructiveness of it all.

If you like painfully real social dramedy, this one is for you; if your threshold for witnessing the lower recesses of human behavior isn't very high, you're likely to find 'Misfortunates' an extremely tasteless affair.

The movie is not too bad but stays clearly behind the book of Dimitri Verhulst. It depicts however quite strongly the destiny of the people that are born in less favored place - destiny that you do not escape easily and that is somehow claimed for its future generation. It happens here that this poor area is a small countryside village in Flanders, with its own code and its 'folklore' with a Belgium humour touch. Nonetheless, such a background message could have been issued as well in a parisian suburb or in a "developing" country. The way out does not change as well: education and self-esteem.

What is it about Belgian Directors? They manage to make films which are about working-class people, full of hard knocks and everyday misery... and yet, not only is there a joie de vivre between the lines, but sweetness and fun. The Misfortunates reminds me very much of the kind of films by the Frères Dardenne...La Promesse, Le Fils... sort of like Ken Loach, but without the total grimness of his vision.

The story is told from the point of view of a young man remembering his time as a thirteen-year-old... at the point where he is taken away from his family because of the degrading environment. I'm not going to go into a description of the film... simply to say that in all the films mentioned above, what shines out especially are the incredibly realistic performances...you totally forget that these are actors, and you learn something about the way "the other half lives", which may horrify you or disgust you, but somewhere in all that, their humanity wins you over. I find this to be a particularly Belgian trait...I can't think of any serious French films that have this capacity for realism, grittiness and humanity. And the ability to make you like something about all the characters, no matter how objectionable they might be for the most part. And of course, these days, there is nothing comparable coming from America, where everything is formulaic. (The closest I've seen to this kind of realism recently in American film is Winters Bone... which comes close but is too manufactured to work on a deeper level.)

The Misfortunates is not to be missed.

I saw this last month at the 2010 Palm Springs International Film Festival where the film's director Felix van Groeningen attended my screening to take an audience Q&A following the film. Adapted from the Dimitri Verhulst novel by van Groeningen and Christopher Dirickx this is the story of young Gunter Strobe (Kenneth Vanbaeden) being brought up by his single and alcoholic father Marcel (Koen de Graeve) after his mother walked out on them. They live at grandma Strobe's (Gilda de Bal) house along with Gunter's hard partying uncles Petrol (Wouter Hendrickx), Beefcake (Johan Heldenbergh) and Koen (Bert Haelvort). the white trash family is so out of control that it's amazing that social services haven't taken Gunter out of this environment a long time ago, although they have threatened to. It's grandma Strobe with the only sensibility and sense of stability and guidance that keeps Gunter in the home but she has reached the point of exasperation in her the behavior of her sons. Valentijn Dhaenens plays the older Gunter looking back at his his childhood years and giving gratitude to his grandmother. this is an excellent cast. I only wish the grandmother's character was more developed and their was more of an on screen presence of her and also a little more of Gunter's mother and her marriage years to Marcel. The character of uncle Koen is underdeveloped as well. Many might find this film about a distasteful family distasteful as well but there is a lot to like in this relatively slow film and lots of dark comedy and genuine tragedy. This was Belgium's official submission to the 82nd Academy Awards for Best foreign Language film. It's van Groeningen's third film and the third time is a charm and I like this film. I'll look forward to more from the young director and more with a bigger budget hopefully. I loved the Roy Orbison scene. I would recommend this and give it an 8.5 out of 10.

I saw this movie yesterday. I was drawn to it because it won the golden Amphora at the "Festival de Quend du film grolandais", an independent movie festival. Seeing the film poster with naked hairy guys cycling, I knew that I would have some fun but how far will they go? In fact, the movie alternates quite hilarious scenes with drunk people with more dramatic sequences. With this consideration, the movie is finally closer to English dramedies that are used to show working class characters and, finally, whatever strange they are, you feel some sympathy for those guys. It's quite comforting to see people who don't care about the others (or perhaps even about anything) but you also see that there are consequences. For sure, this movie is not about preventing the audience from drinking or about giving any lesson. Following the story of Gunther, you just follow the day to day life of a hillbilly family with its ups and downs (a little more ups in the movie). Like they say in "Les cahiers du cinema", Felix van Groeningen makes you love and care for these model people in the same manner as John Cassavetes was able to do. In a nutshell, go and see it (except if you are a feminist of course).