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The ButcherRating:
Release Date: 20 May, 2003 Retail Price: $19.98 OUR Price: $17.99 You SAVE: $1.99! Cast: |
The Butcher Reviews
choice meat
The pretty school mistress in a french provincial town strikes up a friendship with the butcher-- torn between the pleasure of their quiet friendship and her suspicion that he might be a murderer, she hovers between warmth and fright.
Chabrol's film tells a tight little tale (87 minutes), is quite beautiful to watch with it's lovely sixties color and camera angle's, and is wonderfully ambigous in it's depiction of moral's and affection.
If you're into well-crafted suspense, do yourself a favor and watch it.
Inevitably, Bad Things Happen
Helene Daville (Stephane Audran) is the school mistress in Tremolat, a quiet village in the Perigord region of France. She's a confident, attractive woman who had a love affair ten years ago and who now has no desire to become enmeshed again. Popaul Thomas (Jean Yanne) is the village butcher. He spent 15 years in the army serving in Indochina and Algeria. He's seen things he doesn't care to talk about. At a wedding they meet and become friends. He is strongly attracted to her, and brings her presents of choice cuts of meat. She likes him, even cares for him in a way, but resists anything more intimate. Then young women are found butchered in the region.
This really isn't a mystery movie and it isn't a tedious psychological drama. The way in which these two people are drawn to each other is at once curious and intriguing. Is Helene a woman who will put herself in danger because she is able to feel so few other things? Is Popaul simply a man who wants more than he has or is he a serial murderer? If he is a murderer, on what levels is he guilty? How deep are the feelings and complexities within Helene as, at one point, she keeps hidden a piece of evidence that could point to the murderer?
I found the movie consistently involving but not one that had me either guessing or emotionally engaged. Audran and Yanne both give outstanding performances. Audran's character seems cool and in control, but she unexpectedly shows deeper feelings, especially when she is dealing with the students in her charge. Yanne looks a little like 80 per cent Mel Gibson and 20 per cent Andy Kaufman. Popaul comes across as an entirely competent man, able to handle whatever might come his way. But at the same time there is a wounded vulnerability about him that can create uneasy feelings. And for old car fans, Helene Daville drives a Citroen 2CV, a model no longer made. It was the French equivalent of the old VW, cheap to buy, reliable, and easy to fix if anything went wrong. It's so ugly a car it has great style.
I thought the movie was involving and well worth watching. The DVD transfer, while not bad, could have used some work.
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