MUBI

This film is a masterpiece or at least so close to being one then in one simple scene one simple act it passes the point of no return that at least in my mind ruined the movie for me. Was it intentional? Probably

The Film is a very dark French comedy about a documentary crew following a Hitman/Serial Killer who is a happy guy and really enjoys his work that we see he loves to talk and fill the crew and viewers in on his philosophy and methods. We even see how he interacts with his family and sometimes reluctantly the crew helps him or becomes victims accidently of his job volunteer innocent bystanders as you could say.

Soon The Line becomes blurred between innocent bystander, Witness and accomplice. Then there is that flip of the switch scene which I won’t spoil or discuss here which disgusts, unnerves and disturbs me so much that the rest of the film could have been a test pattern and still it would have been ruined for me.

I think there was a decision for that scene to affect the audience and it is successful in polarizing the audience so that you can’t not react or have an opinion you are watching the film and enjoying it as entertainment then the scene happens and changes your outlook and are reminded of the reality of the situations that you have just been watching.

Part of me thinks the director did this on purpose to make a social message just like “Funny Games” but another part of me thinks france is such a liberal country and the director wanted to take it to the edge and over to shock

That is also why the lead is not movie star handsome no one in this film it helps heighten the reality by not having stars that can distract and take you out of the story just like a horror film. It adds to the realism and you believe you are witnessing a character a person not a actor playing a character

Either way this is a good film that happens to be foreign and is worth seeing

Unfortunately the directors never really directed another film and Remy Belvaux he died a few years ago so we never got to witness further work by the director but on the DVD there is a trailer for a spy film that apparently was written but never made sadly.

A darkly comic mockumentary about violence and the media. Man Bites Dog follows a film crew who in turn is documenting the day-to-day life of a serial killer. Through the course of the film we get to listen to Benoit’s ideals on life and society, and no matter how twisted they may be, I couldn’t wait for him to say what else was on his mind.

This movie raises a lot of moral questions, specifically that of the film crew. We see them witness countless murders, even that of a kid, but it’s not until the horrible rape scene where they all join in do we start to question them, and that’s the problem. When I first saw this I thought they were horrible and I immediately disliked them following the rape, but it didn’t dawn on me until after the movie that the fact that they stood idly by as Benoit murdered innumerable innocent people makes them horrible from the start. And then there’s Benoit, the wildly perturbed man who disguises his insanity with politeness and a gentleman’s attitude. He’s perhaps one of the greatest anti-heroes around.

The cinematography is nice, and I love how they use the sound, especially when they are chasing the man with the gun in the warehouse, except that he’s too far away to pick up any sound so they instead try to focus in on him with the camera lens instead. Pretty sweet trick. It’s a darkly humerous movie and is worth checking out. It once again proves that European directors have way more balls than us Americans ever will.

A very unique move in the way that it all plays out, this is one of the most entertaining movies I’ve seen from Criterion. Lots of witty dialogue and the whole thing has a tongue-in-cheek feel during pretty much every moment. It’s not really the gun fights or violence that makes this movie stand out, it’s the personality of the main character and the filmmakers trying to keep up with him that really makes it unique. If you love black humor with lots of entertainment value, I would check out this movie.