Daniel (Ange Darnent) lives with his mother Marie-Therese (Audrey Tautou) his distant father and two brothers in Versailles. He's lonely and bored, but is a budding painter. One day there arrives at his school a new boy, Theo (Theophile Baquet), who is basically his alter ego: loud and grungy. But they click immediately, and are soon hanging out together outside school. Sharing similar home lives and having found common interests like vehicles and design, they decide to build a makeshift car and take it on the road. They now become "Microbe" and "Gasoline" as they traverse their DIY automobile across the French countryside. En route, their relationship also changes and deepens.
This is a family-friendly departure for writer-director Michel Gondry after mostly adult-oriented features and a heap of music videos, and good on him for trying to inject some variety into his filmography, but frankly I expected less convention from the maker of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Be Kind Rewind. Primarily, I think this one would've been fresher and more profound had the dynamic been a girl and a boy - with a completely platonic relationship, that is - instead of two boys. I think that would've allowed the film to combat childhood and gender stereotypes and to convey a message to children that boys and girls can find an emotional connection with each other Instead, as it is, for me the main duo felt quite hackneyed, even though Darnent and Bacquet both show promise on screen. Tautou, however, is wasted in a role that offers her no challenges whatsoever.
Gondry wisely depicts the young protagonists as obscene and uncouth (especially Theo), but that touch cannot mask the otherwise deeply cliched narrative and themes, and visually there's nothing distinctive or subversive either. I expected a far stranger family movie from Michel. 6/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment