| RATING: | 80% |
| FORMAT: | DVD |
Despite the excellence of this production, especially in terms of performance, the basic problem here is that it never goes deeply enough into why the eponymous character is the way he is. His busy life is well detailed and exciting, but we never really get to the essence of the man which, in a four-hour diptych like this, partly invalidates its length.
Yet, this is part of the movie’s charm: That such an interesting gangster could exist among the usual dross that passes for the criminal fraternity is precisely why the film was made in the first place. A strangely honorable man who we come to admire as a latter-day Robin Hood.
Jacques Mesrine knows who he is and what he is doing and, so, knows that his life will not end well – but at least he will have enjoyed it to the hilt. He has the courage to be who he is and not live in a permanent state of internal conflict regarding his actual life as compared to his dreams and goals.
It would appear, however, that he wants to prove that he is a man because his father was a milquetoast. He also, like every lotto player, is intelligent enough to want to avoid the soul-sapping nine-to-five routine that most Westerners grind their way through. He comes to realize that the way imprisoned criminals are treated makes the crime statistics worse and develops a more politically-motivated stance to crime as a means toward social change.
No comments:
Post a Comment