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This Man Must DieRating:
Release Date: 20 May, 2003 Retail Price: $19.98 OUR Price: $17.99 You SAVE: $1.99! Cast: |
This Man Must Die Reviews
One Of Chabrol's Best
Early on in this Claude Chabrol film someone is murdered. For those of us who watch Chabrol's films that is not a surprise. What is a surprise however is who and why they die.
The victim was a young boy and his father, Charles (Michel Duchaussoy, "The Unfaithful Wife", "Nada") has vowed to find the person responsible and kill them.
At this point the film turns into a maze as Charles tries to find the killer. Soon events lead him to Helene (Caroline Cellier) who was with the killer at the time of the accident. Charles pretends to be in love with Helene so she will lead him to Paul (Jean Yanne).
"This Man Must Die" does have some shortcomings. I thought it was just too wild a coincident that Charles just happens to run into a man who knows the killer. He actually remembers the date when he meet him. Though of course I understand without a scene like this how would the film get from point "A" to "B"? I also found the music too forceful at times. It expresses more than there needs to be expressed. And a scene in which Charles and Helene get into a fight left me wondering why does she stay with him?
But these grips simply do not compare to the film's over effect. Claude Chabrol is one of my favorite directors. Film after film I found myself entertained. I love watching new movies by him. In "This Man Must Die" Chabrol demonstrates how he is capable of handling such material. He creates tension and then releases it only to slowly build it up again in the following shot.
I also liked the film's small touches. In a scene where Charles goes to meet Helene's family he is shown is room and on the wall there is a picture of a naked woman next to a cross. What a contradiction I thought. What is Chabrol trying to tell us. Then I thought isn't Charles a bit of a contradiction himself? Here he is meet this woman's family while she thinks he loves her but he is actually using her to find his son's killer.
And what about Paul. After we see the way he treats his wife and son we start to think maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea if Charles did kill him. We doubt anyone, besides his mother, would really miss him. He's such a mean spirited person. And that's putting it mildly.
Over all though I think "This Man Must Die" is one of Chabrol's best. It was made at a time when Chabrol was gaining popularity. Already under his belt were such titles as "The Unfaithful Wife", "Les Biches" and "Le Beau Serge". And this movie ranks up with those films. Here is a wonderful film for people to start their Chabrol collection with.
Bottom-line: Very entertaining Claude Chabrol film that should please those who are not familiar with the director's work. Easily ranks among his finest films.
A Marvellous TAle of Grief and Revenge
Charles Thenier (Michel Duchaussoy) is an affluent, middle-aged writer of children's stories whose son has just been killed in a hit and run road accident in Brittany. The police draw a blank at finding the culpable driver. But Thenier, driven by a vengeful obsession, stumbles on a piece of information that leads him to the man he is after. This turns out to be Paul Decourt (Jean Yanne), a wealthy garage owner and a loathsome bully who tyrannizes over his family. It is easy enough for Thenier's hatred of Decourt to survive meeting him but he swiftly finds himself forming emotional ties to the latter's sister-in-law, glamorous TV actress Helene Lanson (Caroline Cellier) and to his deeply alienated son Philippe (Marc di Napoli).
In Britain this film is known as `The Beast Must Die'. The latter title is better. Partly because it is the original title of the English novel (by Nicholas Blake) on which the film is based. Partly because unlike the American title it doesn't make a nonsense of the title's allusion to `Ecclesiastes' as paraphrased by Brahms for the piece Chabrol incorporates in the sound track: as translated in the movie, `Il faut que la bete meure; mais l'homme aussi. L'un et l'autre doivent mourir.' `This man must die' doesn't really get it, does it? (Oh and by the way, be careful you don't go confusing this film with `The Beast Must Die' a very silly, but nonetheless very enjoyable and in any case extremely different British werewolf flick from 1974).
The likes of Quentin Tarantino and Chan-wook Park have made vengeance a fashionable subject for movies these days but you'll have to look a long way to find a film that tackles the subject as intelligently, honestly and beautifully as this. It's like a variant on "Kill Bill" but with a moral and intellectual maturity Tarantino will never come close to. It's one of the best of the Chabrol movies I know, wonderfully atmospheric and with Charol's fabulous flair for the small quirky details of the more or less everyday French live whose explosive disruptions form the subject matter of his often, and certainly this is a case in point, wonderful dramas.
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