[POLISSE
opens in Cleveland on Friday June 1st exclusively at the Cedar Lee
Theatre.]
Review by Bob
Ignizio
POLISSE is
a French drama about the Child Protection Unit of the Paris police
force that investigates crimes against children, mostly of a sexual
nature. Writer/director/star
Maiwenn actually spent time with the real Paris CPU, and all the
cases in the film were based on real crimes. Given that background
and the film's gritty, almost documentary feel, one would expect some
powerful and affecting moments. And there are some, but not nearly
enough.
POLISSE
has a similar feel to Lee Daniels' PRECIOUS
in that it deals with serious, disturbing subject matter in a way
that occasionally goes so far over the top as to border on camp.
Investigating the kind of crimes we see in POLISSE
day after day might well lead one to develop a dark sense of humor as
a coping mechanism, and that's understandable. That this film should
approach the subject with an equally jaundiced eye, however, seems
less so.
Questions
of tone aside, there are other less subjective problems with POLISSE.
Chief among these is a large ensemble cast that Maiwenn seems
incapable of juggling. There's also not much of a plot, just a parade
of the horribles as characters so thinly defined as to be little more
than cop show cliches hop from one sordid, unresolved case to another
while dealing with an overwhelming surplus of personal issues. To
some degree, this does serve to give a sense of how overwhelmed the
CPU must be, but it also results in a film that lacks focus.
The
only thing really tying POLISSE
together is a photo journalist played Maiwenn herself who is assigned
to cover the unit. This character could have served as an unobtrusive
audience surrogate and been effective as such, but the film feels the
need to have her become involved in an unconvincing romance with one
of the officers. The magic moment when she wins his heart happens
when she takes off her glasses and lets down her hair, suddenly
standing revealed as a beauty. That schtick was already corny by the
fifties, but here it's played totally straight. It's all topped off
with an ending that was probably meant to be grim, powerful, and
thought provoking but instead comes off as contrived and absurd. 2
out of 4 stars.
"The only thing really tying POLISSE together is a photo journalist played Maiwenn herself who is assigned to cover the unit."
ReplyDeletemaybe when you learn to write in proper english, your analyses will become more credible. i don't know what film you saw, but certainly not the *polisse* i watched and loved.
Wow, you caught me. I forgot the word "by" and didn't manage to catch it during the editing process. I guess that makes the substance of my review moot. Certainly no other reviewer, be they an unpaid blogger such as myself or a high profile journalist writing for a major newspaper, has ever made a similar mistake. Guess it's time for me to hang up my writin' spurs and ride off into the sunset.
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