Simply A Masterpiece

One of my all time favorites.

Charming and brutal

Amateur movie with Big budget

Denis Villeneuve does it with particular style. This time the poor girl is Bibiane Champagne (Marie-Josée Croze), she's supposed to be daughter of some very important figure. Unable to fulfil all the expectations, she easily gets quite depressed so she often over drinks and does drugs. The problems obviously appear. After a rough night at some club, while driving home with quite an excess of alcohol in her blood, half awake half asleep, she hits a fishmonger. Afraid, she doesn't stop and concluding the rest of her way home. When she wakes up next morning her problem start. She feels persecuted and haunted what she did. After drowning her car, maybe to kill evidences, maybe to eliminate what she believed to be reminding her of the incident. Few days later, the fishmonger she had hit before was found dead at home. Few days later, she meets that fishmonger's son. This whole story is brought to you by the strangest means: the mouth of a huge and heinous fish, in a table waiting to have its head cut. About Croze, I think I'm not the only one to think there is a big waste of a talent in there. Its title Maelström stands for a very powerful whirlpool, very useful in myths and legends. Although it appears dark and heavy, this movie is very refreshing. Dennis uses a lot of bright colours, especially white and blue to contrast with the old and dragged voice of the dying fish. 8/10

Maelstrom is a unique blend of happenstance, a touch of magical realism and a cautionary tale wrapped in the stunning cinematography Andre Turpin. Unfortunately when one reads a synopsis of the film the reviewers focus on a brief yet impactive scene that happens at the beginning of the film. The irony is this scene is handled deftly and tastefully by Director Denis Villeneuve. But due to the skewed American sensibilities surrounding sex and violence, a masterful portrayal of daily reality is maligned as shocking and graphic. Frankly I'm more disturbed by images I see on the nightly news and on reality TV. So if you can ignore the synopsis a brilliantly poetic piece of cinema awaits you. This is a well crafted film whose visual elements carry the tale, (a lesson M. Night Shamalyan could have used before engulfing his audience in the endless exposition of Lady In the Water) that is ultimately uplifting.

"Maelstrom" is all about Bibi (Croze) who has an abortion and then, traumatized and suffering pangs of guilt, she proceeds to perpetrate a series of felonies. So goes the plot of this amateurish film which is narrated by a fish. The upside of this subtitled French-Canadian film is good work by Croze and cast. However, the film shows an obvious lack of talent behind the lens. Uneven, herky-jerky, quirky to the absurd, with hackneyed irony, nonsense for filler, awful music, poor quality video and subtitling, and not fitting any genre, "Maelstrom" is one to be flushed. (D+)

The film opens with a large, visibly injured, and obviously fake fish talking directly to the audience. Nearby a man is cutting up fish. The talking fish says that his life in nearly over, and he would like to tell a "pretty" story with his last breaths. Then we cut to a beautiful woman, in a doctor's office. We soon figure out that she is having an abortion. As we see the fetal matter being incinerated and her leaving the building, the grossly perky song "Good Morning Starshine" begins to play. Okay... This is obviously not going to be your normal film.The woman is named Bibiane (Marie-Josée Croze), and she turns out to be the main character. Perhaps related to the abortion, it soon becomes clear that her life is not going too well right now. Not long into the film she is removed from her position in the family business, a chain of upscale clothing stores, by her brother (although at first I thought he was her estranged or ex-husband).Most reviews or plot summaries go into more detail about events that occur in the middle and end of the film, but I'll keep it to that. There are some rather unlikely coincidences along the way, in case that sort of thing bothers you. And there is a distinct water theme, which is not surprising given the title. I would classify the film as primarily a drama, since the laughs are mostly at surprising events rather than strictly funny ones, and because the film kept me feeling slightly uncomfortable throughout.Marie-Josée Croze is very good here. The cinematography is excellent, with at least one shot that took my breath away. The story and the direction, both by Denis Villeneuve, on the other hand, are somewhat suspect. Besides the aforementioned coincidences, several scenes are juxtaposed in a seemly random manner, and you can't figure them out until later if then. Now this could just be a mechanism to get you to think, and in the wake of Memento (which came out at about the same time as this film) one is becoming used to the idea of the film structure mirroring the main character's thought processes. I'm not sure I completely buy this argument, but I'll give it a little leeway.This film won the best picture, direction, cinematography, screenplay, and actress awards in Canada at their equivalent of the Academy Awards, but it is only just now getting to the United States, where it is expected to play for a very short time. In the San Jose, CA area it is expected on May 17th.Seen on 5/5/2002 at the Camera Cinema Club in San Jose, CA.