L'emmerdeur is a 1973 French black-comedy which does not feature on the top 1000 films of all time.
Ralph Milan (Lino Ventura) is a contract killer preparing to assassinate his target in a hotel room. The only catch? The neighbour in the adjourning room - shirt salesman Francois Pignon (Jacques Brel) - is making preparations to kill himself. Milan has to stop his neighbour from suiciding otherwise the police will catch him in the act.
This film was a complete farce. It was a ridiculous scenario with ridiculous characters yet everything worked so well. It was a very funny film with oodles of black humour that are so popular in France or the UK. I can't see a film like this really having any success in the US. In fact Billy Wilder did do an American remake with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau which came and went without much fanfare.
Milan and Brel made the ultimate odd couple trope with Milan being forced to become a reluctant hero of sorts - he has to stop Brel killing himself, not out of any sense of altruism, but for his own devious means. Most of the humour stems from this comical situation. Pignon irritates the life out of Milan who has no choice but to tolerate it or be exposed by the police.
Just like the characters, the actors also were great together. Ventura served as a brilliant straight man to the comically and tragically pathetic Brel who is heartbroken after his wife leaves him. There is no assortment of both physical humour and witty tongue-in-cheek jokes yet there is also plenty of space for emotional pathos. Despite how Milan initially has nothing but contempt for Brel, we see a begrudging relationship form between the two men.
L'emmerdeur was a thoroughly entertaining film. Silly and farcical yes, but very funny all the same.
No comments:
Post a Comment