In Theaters Jul 30 2008 @ 10:29 pm
REVIEW: Tell No One
Directed By: Guillaume Canet
Written By: Guillaume Canet
Starring: François Cluzet, Marie-Josée Croze, Kristin Scott Thomas
Running Time: 125 minutes
Not Rated
An import from France, Tell No One is a taut, brain-thumping thriller based on the novel of the same name by Harlen Coben. It deals with many of the standard tropes of the genre – past tragedies, missing lovers, wrongfully accused everymen, 11th hour twists and re-twists – but manages to prevent the proceedings from going stale. However, although it doesn’t succumb to the same, dismal fate of other literary pop-thriller adaptations (cough*DaVinci Code*cough*cough), it is still based on a beach read and, ostentatiously so, ends up being the cinematic equivalent of one.
Mysterious emails keep the good doctor up at night.
We start out, as so many of these films do, in the past. Alex Beck (François Cluzet), is vacationing out in the countryside with his beautiful wife, Margot (Marie-Josée Croze). After performing a little dockside night music, the pair gets into an argument and Margot swims off in a huff. Alex stews until startled screams pull him into action, but before he knows it he’s been whacked in the face with a baseball bat. His wife is mysteriously dead and, 8 years later, Alex is still mourning her loss.
Two bodies, one clutching a key to his dead wife’s deposit box, are dug up in the same forest Margot was murdered in, thrusting the case, and Alex, back into the limelight. Toss some intrepid detectives into the mix who think Alex may have been responsible after all, a group of shadowy thugs who use an androgynous female to torture people, and a slew of mysterious emails and videos that may or may not be proof that Margot is really alive, and you have all the fabric you need to weave a decent thriller out of. Ho hum.
Run, François, run!
The reason for my ambivalence is somewhat difficult to pinpoint. The film is quite intelligent, never insulting you with ludicrous plot turns or whodunnit reveals that smack of stupidity. Cluzet is great in the lead role, recalling a slightly younger Dustin Hoffman (I could not get Marathon Man out of my head during the film’s thrilling midpoint chase sequence). And the ending is quite satisfying, fooling you into thinking you’ve discovered the truth multiple times (but not in a tiresome way). My issue, I believe, is that the central dramatic conflict in the film, the fuel that keeps the engine running, lacks any emotional weight.
Take the somewhat odd example of Braveheart. The time is taken at the beginning of the film to convince us that the love between Wallace and his beautiful bride is genuine, so that when her throat is slit by the despicable English lord we (literally in my case) cry out in anger and horror. Wallace is subsequently driven by his outrage and we, the audience, are driven along with him. The emotional weight of the romance is the fuel that Braveheart runs on, and since it resonates with us deeply we connect with the film fully.
I'm not a scmaltzy kind of guy, but the film needed a lot more of this in order to succeed emotionally.
Tell No One lacks that. Margot registers as barely more than a pretty Naomi Watts look-a-like before she’s dead and we’re off to the races. Although Alex certainly cares whether or not she’s alive, we don’t. The mystery of what really happened that night by the lake remains terrifically engrossing, but the emotional climax of the film, in which Alex discovers the truth of his wife’s fate, sputters on fumes. Ho hum.
To be honest, though, you will not be disappointed with this movie. Although it does nothing new, it is a shining example of the suspenseful thriller and easily smacks down any American stabs at the genre in the last five years. While it remains in the mind afterwards about as long as your typical beach read does (i.e., “Well that was an enjoyable…ooh, look, a shiny penny!”), sometimes you just need a good genre thrill that doesn’t feel aimed at a 4 year old. Tell No One fits that bill exactly.
on Jul 31 2008 @ 4:22 am 1. Alexander Coleman said …
I love the first hour or so of Braveheart because it almost recalls the beauty of silent cinema. You’re right, the emotional beats are profound in that opening act, and its simple, pure cinematic pulchritude is terrific. But to me the film lost its way shortly thereafter, becoming a somewhat monotonous epic, which butchered history (but that’s not really one of my main criticisms).
I understand your problems with Tell No One, and I have some reservations myself about the limitations imposed on Canet in telling his story, but the emotional chord was moving in an ephemeral way that is difficult to manufacture.
Oh, and on a base note, I think Marie-Josee Croze is much more beautiful than Naomi Watts but that’s just me.
Now you’ve got to check out my review, Evan. We can keep trading posts on this sucker at each other’s blog, haha.
on Jul 31 2008 @ 10:14 am 2. Evan Derrick said …
That emotional chord just didn’t resonate with me. At all. I wish it had, but it didn’t. Ho hum. It really is a great little thriller and will please anyone who takes the time to watch it, though. I can’t emphasize that enough, despite my reservations.
on Jul 31 2008 @ 1:06 pm 3. Craig Kennedy said …
I see what you’re saying how we responded to this movie completely differently, but came to the same star rating. Funny.
To me the beginning was enough, and Cluzet’s performance solidified it so I bought into it.
The things I liked best about the movie is how restrained it was. The American remake will over-emphasize the thriller elements I can almost guarantee it.
One of the reasons the relatively low tech chase was so good in this movie was because it was surprising. Up to that point, the film had been on kind of a low simmer with a threatening doom hanging over everything.
on Jul 31 2008 @ 3:44 pm 4. Sam Juliano said …
Evan, I went even lower than your 3 and a half, (I gave it 2 and a half) but we are on the same page with it. I understand your ambivalence entirely, even if our reasons may not be quite the same. In my viewing I was simply unwilling to accept the convolutions of the story. Craig does have a point with that low simmer, and both he and Alexander wtote superb treatments of the film that I was fortunate to read. But what sets me apart (and you need to corroborate this) is that I found the film rather distancing, all the result of narrative suppositions that were non-negotiable.
on Jul 31 2008 @ 4:25 pm 5. Luke Harrington said …
I have to say that reading this review and the comments have gotten me really interested in the film. I imagine I’d probably enjoy it more than most you did…a good potboiler is hard to find.
on Aug 01 2008 @ 10:25 am 6. Rick Olson said …
Think I’m gonna watch it as well. First one on the Netflix queue is a rotten egg …
on Aug 01 2008 @ 1:22 pm 7. Daniel said …
You and me are peas in a pod on this one, Evan.
Nobody can deny that chase sequence was awesome, though. The camerawork was especially impressive.
on Aug 01 2008 @ 2:36 pm 8. John said …
Sorry about the trackback from our site but it was related to the movie. Wont repeat it again. Take care.
on Aug 01 2008 @ 2:46 pm 9. Evan Derrick said …
“Related to the movie” is just fancy talk for “contextual spam.” But thankyou for the apology. That, at least, shows a measure of class.
on Aug 01 2008 @ 2:49 pm 10. John said …
We would like to know more about your site if its cool with you. Please add me on gmail whenever you get the time. I would love to share my ideals and my love for cinema.
on Aug 01 2008 @ 4:39 pm 11. Evan Derrick said …
See, now you’re talking John. I do have to admit you guys have a pretty slick site going on there. Would love to hear more about your thoughts on cinema. That’s what this here internet thing is good for!
on Aug 02 2008 @ 3:00 am 12. John said …
Firstly i would like to inform you that trackbacks are not spam. You need to know that first before you get messed around with that again. Secondly our site would love to help your site in any way possible. Like for instance we would like to reviews for your site for a price. We are pretty exclusive in our choice of film. We believe that cinema is an idealistic phenomenon. This is the reason why not all the movies will feature on our site. We sort of filter out the films we dont consider worthy. We dont write bad reviews for any of the films. We respect directors who take and put in a lot of work for their movies. For that reason we dont we have rankings. Most of our reviews as you can see our favorable. This is because of the choice of the movies. We only add movies we love period.
on Aug 02 2008 @ 3:30 am 13. Rahul said …
Hey Evan, guess u ticked off my friend, but u dont seem to know much about trackbacks firstly. Secondly, u have a “Trackback this Post” link on every post, so obviously people will trackback. Thridly, Wordpress won’t have this oldest feature if it were spam which apparently is not. Its being widely used by all bloggers on the net. Here is what Trackback actually means….
Trackback is used to tell the other blog that you link in your post, basically it just said “Hey your post is useful and put it on my blog“
So you know Ignorance is Bliss, so we are assuming that u have no clue about it, so thats that….Best thing is to remove the Trackback this post link on every post.
Why so serious? Without knowing anything without any reason accusing a reputable professional site of spamming. Now thats being really cheap.
We are both here for the same reason for cinema, why do you think your the only one trying to do something for Good Cinema. We want to have a collaboration of some way so that we could be beneficial to each other and help Cinema, thats the reason me and my friend are here. We enlighten people about films and we talk about films from all over the world.
So, if you would be kind enough, to add us on msn at sr_prem@hotmail.com or write down ur Email address so that we could talk about Cinema
Cheers
on Aug 02 2008 @ 10:17 am 14. Evan Derrick said …
Guys, I do understand how trackbacks work, but typically they are used to facilitate conversation between blogs. It’s an easy way to find out who is linking to you and vice versa. You posted a comment that linked back your site, but you failed to either 1) discuss anything that I had written or 2) mention my post/review in the article on your own site. Technically that isn’t spam, since you’re not using some kind of automated bot to mass post comments to blogs. But it’s not really a trackback either, since you were simply using my blog to post a link to your own. I’ll keep the “trackback this post” link on each page, but I’m still going to delete comments (and trackbacks) that aren’t actually interested in engaging with what I’ve written.
I would love, however, to collaborate with you someway in the future. I’m not sure what you had in mind, but you can find my email address at the top of the page.
Also, mad props for working a Dark Knight line into your comment.