MovieChat Forums > Feux rouges (2004) Discussion > Manhood Stripped

Manhood Stripped

posted 20 years ago by SurrenderToto
15 replies | jump to latest

Don't go looking for American style "thrills" in this movie. The tensions of an "ordinary" crisis are explored, but the driving force is Antoine's sense of stripped manhood.

Alcohol is the fuel to this means, though Darrousin's flat-faced acting style and the camera's relative flat-facing and lingering pictures leave us a little empty and uninvolved. Impotency in the face of modern urban life is juxtaposed with "manly" dream-like outbursts--speeding, drunkenness, buddy loyalty, and man-to-man "combat," in rural settings and deep forest, followed by a waking and return to loving, dependent domestic emotions and an unconscious manly response to spousal violation. The crime story, including the unspoken rape, the ultimate degradation of woman, was just a cover. Antoine returns to his cage and to wag his tail for womanhood triumphant.

It is always the best policy to speak the truth--unless, of course, you are an exceptional liar.
Jerome K. Jerome

[–] buff-29 20 years ago

Yeah, but did you hate the movie? I did. The plot was totally unbelievable. As an ex-drunk, though, I give Darroussin a lot of credit for a realistic portrayal of a juicehead.

[–] SurrenderToto 20 years ago

buff - That's strange about the getting drunk part. You see, when he talks to his wife he says, "I hardly ever take a drink, right?" and she agrees. So that means he's not a habitual drinker. So I never get why he starts to drink and drink so heavily. Maybe he's not telling the truth about his drinking to start (don't drinkers do alot of denial?) Or heavy wine drinking doesn't count in his mind?

Anyway, to your question, no I rated it quite highly for the calm realistic way is went through a "crisis." O.K., so the coincidence about the wife on the train and the husband's meeting the criminal in the bar makes for an interesting twist. It was foretold, however, by the director from the radio broadcasts and the "didn't you see his scar" comment. Mysteries and "thrillers" depend on such twists. You want to watch a movie where nothing interesting happens? Then go outside and look at the sky and be amazed everyday.

Anyway, that doesn't matter too much to me. I hesitate to make generalizations, but the French tend to take a much less hysterical approach to their "thrillers" that I find entrancing, cinematically interesting and anthropologically intriguing.

If so many men, so many minds, certainly so many hearts, so many kinds of love.
~ Tolstoy

[–] 20 years ago

[deleted]

[–] buff-29 20 years ago

Nancy: The incredible coincidence on the highway wasn't the only silly aspect of this "plot." As to the drinking: Yes, he says he hardly ever drinks but we see him drinking in the morning, drinking straight out of the bottle, etc. and so we know he is a chronic drunk, no matter what he says. The depiction of a drunkard was the only interesting part of this movie. The French can't make thrillers. Whenever you see a good French thriller or gangster movie, look closely and you will find that an American is behind it.

[–] SurrenderToto 20 years ago

buff - If one focuses on the realistic possibilities in the plot, don't even begin to compare it with antics in standard fare shoot-'em up, crash the car Hollywood films.

To quote Stephen Holden (NYTs) and to echo my own first comments:

"The movie is a study of male passive agression that comes up with a malicious Hemingwayesque solution to Antoine's mascilinity crisis. When his wife, fed up with his drinking on the road, deserts him to take the train, he picks up a hitchhiker he knows may be a dangerous escaped convict and courts the redemptive (and grisly) male rite of passage he's been seeking. Following Jean-Luc Godard's "Weekend" and Claire Denis's "Friday Night," "Red Lights" uses the traffic jam as a potent screen metaphor for something bigger."

May I also recommend the excellent "Sur Mes Levres" (Read My Lips) (2001), for more violence, motion and tension (in the current fashion) in a French movie.

Before you dismiss an entire cinematic tradition (and with it, another culture), it would be wise to familiarize yourself with both.

N.

It is always the best policy to speak the truth--unless of course you are an exceptionally good liar.
~ Jerome K. Jerome

[–] buff-29 20 years ago

Yeah, I saw Read My Lips last summer in Woodstock. It made absolutely NO SENSE. What I want in these movies is action that has some logic, some consistency, something that makes it possible to be interested in the characters and what happens to them. Stephen Holden is a Times movie critic and therefore to many people (and to you, I guess) is automatically brilliant, but he is just a guy with a keyboard, like you and me. He has terrible taste in thrillers, whether US or foreign. I also saw Friday Night. My heavens, the main character was a traffic jam. Now that was a boring movie. I am rarely sorry I saw a film (there is usually something to be interested in) but if I want to spend a couple of hours in a stalled car I will take a cab up Park Ave. at rush hour. Sheesh. Weekend is from another tradition altogether and has no place in this discussion. (And I didn't like it, either)

[–] faustian_jargon 19 years ago

Hmmm, I was about to go see this film tonight, but I'll think I'll give it a miss now thanks.
Another self-depricating 'masculinity' film? I don't think so. Aren't all films and sitcoms and dramas about that. It's all bad man, bad man, how boring and self-hating can you get and not implode, that's the real mystery of these sorts of films. What amazes me most about this (obviously I'm just blindly piecing it together from reviews cos I haven't seen it) is that no-one sees the irony of men making these kind of films - like men who say "I'm an animal and I can't help myself", or "I'm a really bad person". Does no-one see the weird irony of this? Do these guys ever sit down after watching their films and think "Hang on, I'm making a film that paints me as a bad person and displaces responsibility for my behaviour onto my genetic code. That's not right, I deserve better than that. I want to know why I act out this self-destructive behaviour, program in new patterns and make life easier on myself. " Or do they think "Flavour of the month, a whole bunch of self-righteous and self-hating suckers are gonna lap this up." (?)

[–] j-miguel-goncalves 19 years ago

Why do you go see French movies then ? if you dislike them so much ? Quoting you: "Doesn't make sense".

[–] buff-29 11 years ago

This buff-29 is one sharp fellow. I have been going through some of his old posts and it is amazing how articulate and intelligent they are. He is almost always right about movies and also right about the unfortunates who disagree with him. And he is even (usually) able to be polite to them, despite their evident ignorance.

[–] cinegal-2 19 years ago

buff-29. Are you serious about French filmmakers & thrillers? Just one example to point out your folly: Ever heard of a guy named Jean-Pierre Melville? OK, let me give you another name to check out: Claude Chabrol. So, still not convinced? Here's still another: Henri-Georges Clouzot. Now, go and do some homework and report back.

[–] buff-29 13 years ago

This thread has been abandoned long ago but I just reread several of the posts and I am compelled to say that this Buff29 is really smart. He is cogent, succinct, logical, and gentle with his inferiors. What a fellow. I hope I get to meet him someday. I suppose that cinegal-2 has by now gone where ever such people go, so I won't bother to tell her that her French idols all have feet of boring, crumbling clay. A pack of phonies, really.

[–] novelle 19 years ago

This movie is not about the celebration of womanhood but reclaiming manhood by reverting to caveman tactics of violence and rape. At the end of the movie, Antoine does not return to his "cage" but is once again king of the castle.

[–] Schezzi 18 years ago

I too was rather perturbed that Helene had to be diminished in order to have the unsettling 'happy ending' of this movie - from the breadwinner and independent woman, her injury and rape leave her shaken and needy and anxious to be the good wife and mother. I feel Antoine is undeservedly successful at getting what he wants by the end of the movie, and there's a rather unpleasant undercurrent of manhood being asserted, rather than him 'returning to his cage'.

[–] Gong5 14 years ago

best comment on this board. afgan men by law starving women to death in 2010 with superpowers sponsoring their "elections". revolting, as me are to women.

[–] gunttache 18 years ago

agree with you novelle. If that's the idea of the movie than it makes sense and it was worth making it. However, it was not clearly delivered. I wonder if anybody read the story written by Simenon after having seen the movie? Maybe that's what the film's director wanted to achieve with all the open questions in the movie?