Change Your Image
remantell
Reviews
Une si Belle Époque! La France d'avant 1914 (2019)
dialog is trash
The colorized pictures are great, showing Paris and its denizens in the period from 1900 to the Great War. However, the dialog is sheer trash. It would make things which began years, if not centuries, earlier, into some kind of fabulous Progressive movement suddenly ended by a resurgence of feudalism in the guns of August 1914. It appears the producers tried to fit their desired story to the available footage rather than let the latter speak for itself. In short, it is what the English-speaking world knows as "Whig History." It can be viewed on MHz in their French Collection with English subtitles. It is not the film by the same name done several decades ago and the film quality is much better.
La Malédiction de Provins (2019)
really dumb
Another laughable attempt at a murder mystery in a series more aptly named Romance In... It "borrows" elements from another mystery video (I think Montalbano) where a director, in order to get the most out of his actors, puts them through psychological stress.
It also repeats an element from an earlier episode where a secret medieval passage contains a functioning stone door operated by a stone switch. It was silly then, sillier now.
And it contains a huge flaw, upon which the entire plot turns, when the lady detective (alone at night, of course, before she is attacked) finds a contraption, on the ground, intended to keep a dagger from penetrating deeply somehow separated from the blade too which it was attached, and figured out by her pathologist lover.
One star is too much.
Le Mort de la plage (2018)
laughable
Like most of the Murder In series this one was laughable, all the more so if the producers intended to sell it in the US. No soldier's personal file would be Top Secret, nor contain operation details unless they were part of a commendation, nor would any sergeant be promoted to major for any reason, much less saving a civilian from being raped. I'll give the producers credit for trying make some details credible, but the major is missing his pinks and or is certainly not wearing his battle uniform, and the bugle is the strangest one I've ever seen, the 3-volley salute is done much more rapidly, and Americans do not wear an ID bracelet like that shown. I also doubt the Normandy cemeteries have detailed archival operation information. 4-5 thousand Allied soldiers were killed on D-Day, not 200,000, and about 130,000 participated in the initial invasion, not 600,000. 860,000 tho had landed by the end of June.
Commissaire Magellan: Mortel refrain (2021)
tedious
After the first season, and a large cast change, Magellan becomes astonishingly repetitive. That, and the many goofs, improbabilities and elisions make it tiresome despite its scenery and spectacular mansions, with low-e windows and Dutch cleanliness. In that, it often appears to emulate some of the British in this genre, but it is nevertheless very French, every episode having a mistress or two, long lost child, crime passionnel and moral. In later seasons, a second murder in the last 10-15 minutes became de rigueur, while the family scenes became ludicrous (no pun intended). Thankfully, tho the murders are less gruesome than some, generally being only impulsive thumps on the head, which require no pathologist, the principals trampling and touching everything anyhow. And they always take place at night, so Magellan can have his breakfast before jetting around all day in what appears to be a Peugeot commercial. French police seem to have instant access to all manner of information. Sometimes, more than instant. Somehow, too, his tiny lieutenant assistant manages to outrun and handcuff all manner of miscreants in high heels without receiving a scratch. Fantastic breakfasts and dinners mysteriously appear as well, no time being given to grocery shopping, and tho, Magellan rarely seems to actually eat lunch, he appears quite a bit heavier at the end, than at the beginning. Saignac, too, appears to be a fabulous place to live, having all manner of clubs, fields, pools, museums, circuses, zoos, galleries, etc and numerous businesses. In all, a good deal of suspension of disbelief is required by Magellan.