FrankMMueller

"Y yo a ti" is a small film jewel. The short film with a small budget deals with the topic of friendship and love. Two young men meet in a park and have a conversation. Director Oliver Rondon takes five minutes to reveal the essence of a real friendship. He uses a good script with short but expressive dialogues and films them in well-chosen, varied camera perspectives that are interesting. The actors (including the director himself) play touching and personable without being kitschy. That is what makes the film so poignant and authentic and, above all, believable. The twist of the film at the end of the conversation is extremely surprising, unpredictable, and so heart-warming it brings tears to your eyes. A small Masterpiece !!

How far does one go to succeed? This is the question the movie 'Un homme idéal' deals with. In it, Pierre Niney plays the unsuccessful author Mathieu, to whom chance gives the diary of a dead man, which he unceremoniously transforms into his own novel and thus has the much-awaited mega-success. A small step with a big impact. Because at some point the world of literature expects a follow-up work and even worse, someone contacts Mathieu who has known the real author. Finally Mathieu is involved in a spiral of violence and lies, which gets its own momentum and can no longer be stopped ... Director Yann Gozlan presents a story in a stringent rhythm that Alfred Hitchcock probably would have loved. Like the master of suspense, Gozlan tumbles down the save world of his protagonist within a short moment and let him fight to survive. And just like Hitchcock, Gozlan manages that we feel sympathy for Mathieu, no matter how drastic the actions are he takes to uphold the dizziness. And with that, the director avoids giving a moral judgment on Mathieu, he leaves that to the viewer. 'Un homme idéal' is brilliantly staged with the camera, fluidly narrated, without fast cuts, logically constructed, in beautiful colors and in the present time a recovery for the eye. The story is without any length and gives a constant tension. After 104 minutes you wonder how fast the time has passed. The film is focused on its leading actor, this leaves the supporting players a little pale in their character, but that is criticism at the highest level. And that in the end one or two little things of the logic ago might be reconsidered, finally doesn't matter at all. The moral of the movie, without giving away too much, is the fact, that whoever climbs high can still fall a lot deeper. The end of the movie is suprising, harrowing and deeply touching. The film has consistently excellent actors, most notably the new French superstar Pierre Niney, here in Germany best known from Francois Ozon's 'Frantz' (in the UK probably with 'Yves Saint Laurent'). Pierre Niney comes from the theater (La Comédie Francaise) and can rightly be described as the greatest talent since Patrick Dewaere. So far, he has delivered outstanding performance in all of his films. At the moment he has huge success in France with a biopic about the french writer Romain Gary. Unfortunately, this film (La promesse de l 'aube) as well as 'Un homme idéal' has not yet found a German distributer and one wonders how it can be that every stupid crap is thrown on the market and successful films like 'Un homme idéal' (about 700.000 admissions in France) and 'La promesse de l'aube' (after 3 weeks already 750.000 admissions) can not find a german distributor !!! Who would not like to relinquish instead one of these unbearable real-life comic book films from the States ????

I think that there already is enough said what "Looking" is all about. I must admit, that I really loved the series because of its authenticity, its good story and its extremely well done acting. I still don't understand why it was canceled after season 2. There was an (typical) open end and we all assumed and looked forward to a third season. Instead there was a movie made to close a chapter (like Patrick is saying in the movie). The problem is, that 80 minutes are not enough to close the chapter of four or five people. So the story is a little bit to much focused on Patricks character - but, so what? In the end we won't get anything new and the way the story ends is disappointing, because it's not what we would have liked to see. Kevin is the word! And that brings me to the ulti-mate highlight of the movie. Talking about love scenes in movies, like "Gone with the wind" or "Love Story" or "Titanic". Well - watch Russell Tovey in "Looking" and add this to the others. He only needs five words to say ("Why? - Because I love you"), a hug, a kiss, a touch and a look to create the most heartrending love scene I ever had the privelege to watch. He's only got about ten minutes of the entire movie on screen - but what ten minutes !! Enough to break ones heart. Giving a very strong performance throughout the whole series, this man is an acting genius and that's what makes it worth to watch this movie.