{"id":7928,"date":"2010-02-21T23:58:15","date_gmt":"2010-02-22T07:58:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=7928"},"modified":"2010-02-22T07:03:03","modified_gmt":"2010-02-22T15:03:03","slug":"je-me-souviens-andre-forcier-2009-canada","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/?p=7928","title":{"rendered":"Je Me Souviens (Andre Forcier, 2009): Canada"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Rowan-George Smith<\/a>. \u00a0Viewed at the Metro 4, Santa Barbara Film Festival.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Je Me Souviens (\u201cI Remember\u201d) is a quirky, inventive, and over-the-top farce-like film directed by the accomplished Canadian filmmaker Andre Forcier.\u00a0 Narrated by Louis, the son of a union leader, the film takes place in a gossipy mining community set in 1949 in Abitibi.\u00a0 The film includes a collective group of Quebec actors, Roy Dupuis, Celine Bonnier and introducing Alice Morel-Michaud as Nemesis \u2013 interestingly the films original title.<\/p>\n

On Valentine\u2019s Day night, Mathilde\u2019s (Celine Bonnier) husband, Richard Bombardier (David Boutin) accidentally dies and the mining community spreads rumors that Mathilde killed her husband.\u00a0 The gossip is started by Anita (Helene Bourgeois-Leclerc) and Marguerite (Julie DuPage), the wives of the town\u2019s union leaders, Robert Sincennes (Pierre-Luc Brillant) and Roch Devos (Mario Saint-Amand).\u00a0 The widowed wife Mathlide plots to take out revenge on the two women, she seduces both of their husbands, then finds herself pregnant and doesn\u2019t know whom the father is.\u00a0 Mathlide becomes an alcoholic mess as she attempts to raise her beastly daughter Nemesis (Alice Morel-Michaud).\u00a0 Cut to nine years later, Liam Hennessy (Roy Dupuis), an exiled Irishman, takes an interest in the mute young girl, Nemesis.\u00a0 She warms up to him and becomes his pupil and learns Gaelic.\u00a0 In another accident, Mathilde dies as she attempts to bond with her demonic daughter ice-skating.\u00a0 And, Nemesis and her friend Louis go off to Ireland with Liam.<\/p>\n

Celine Bonnier, Roy Dupuis, and Alice Morel-Michaud all give the finest performances in the film.\u00a0 Bonnier is versatile as Mathide, playing the good wife, sexy vamp, and alcoholic mother.\u00a0 Dupuis is charming, likeable, and gives a simplistic performance as Liam, the only true role model and father figure to Nemesis.\u00a0 His chemistry with Morel-Michaud is enduring.\u00a0 Dupuis extensively studied Gaelic for the role.\u00a0 Morel-Michaud is a force to be reckoned with, she delivers the most impressive performance, and it didn\u2019t feel contrived like other actors in the film.\u00a0 This young actress was so authentic and her work organic, she had amazing screen presence, and her acting is brilliant.\u00a0 Alice is a diamond in the rough.\u00a0 Other honorable mentions in performances include: Renaud Pinet-Forcier as young Louis Sincennes, Nemesis\u2019s friend.\u00a0 Helene Bourgeois-Leclerc, the tap-dancing night operator who works at the telephone company, and records telephone conversations.<\/p>\n

Veteran filmmaker, Andre Forcier, directs this odd and complicated film, with a heavy ensemble cast.\u00a0 So many characters made the film difficult to follow at times.\u00a0 It would have been preferred if there were a few less characters and an allowance made for more story time for the well established core characters.\u00a0 Forcier had a small budget to make this film, yet managed to line up an impressive group of talented actors.\u00a0 The controversial director of Quebec cinema shot the black and white film with a digital camera due to the tight budget, which the film industry in Quebec allegedly restricted him to, and what was missing, was the grainy film quality.\u00a0 It\u2019s interesting that Forcier, provided the voice of Louis in the narration.\u00a0 And was that his son playing Louis? Tight budget, I\u2019ll say.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Rowan-George Smith. \u00a0Viewed at the Metro 4, Santa Barbara Film Festival. Je Me Souviens (\u201cI Remember\u201d) is a quirky, inventive, and over-the-top farce-like film directed by the accomplished Canadian filmmaker Andre Forcier.\u00a0 Narrated by Louis, the son of a union leader, the film takes place in a gossipy mining community set in 1949 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":805,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,131],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7928","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-films","category-santa-barbara-film-festival-2010"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7928","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/805"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7928"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7928\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7928"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7928"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/studentfilmreviews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7928"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}