Patrice Leconte's film "Suicide Shop"

Movie premiere

Patrice Leconte combined the atmosphere of old French cinema with modern 3D animation

The author of "Girls on the Bridge"'s first experience in the field of hand-drawn cinema - a bizarre mix of French poetic realism and experimental animation - gave ANDREY PLAKHOV an unexpected feeling of déjà vu.

How beautiful the French province is and how terrible it is! It’s wonderful to come there as a tourist: the people there, especially after Paris, seem kind and kind, and life seems settled and carefree. But God forbid you end up here for permanent residence: the melancholy that killed Flaubert’s Emma Bovary will also have a stranglehold on you, so beware. Once I found myself in such a town, a local resident, a sad young woman, took me around it and showed me: “Here is the 13th century cathedral, here is the castle where Mary Tudor stayed, but here is a sex shop - only one, and even that one is closed.”

The action of “The Suicide Shop” takes place in approximately this provincial town. It’s so sad here that all the residents dream of saying goodbye to life as soon as possible. Husbands - because their wives nag them. Teenagers - because their parents do not understand them. Everything is like with people - only exaggerated to the level of universal bitterness and imbued with spicy, often politically incorrect jokes. And only the smartest of the aborigines - members of one nimble family - make a business out of this common fad: they open a shop and offer a wide range of goods for dying - from soap and rope to poisonous snakes.

This is the first idea that inspired Patrice Leconte, a master of black melodrama and black comedy, who loves grotesque situations. For example, in his film “Pleasure Street”, by order of the military authorities in Paris in 1945, all brothels are closed - how are you supposed to live after that? And in "Suicide Shop" it is difficult not to feel the breath of the economic depression characteristic of our days. But it is also shown not only from the banal side: the crisis is driving someone into a loop, but aren’t there enough people who want to make money from it?

The second idea is also characteristic of Leconte. He pretends to be cynical, but cannot rid himself of his inherent sentimentality. And therefore, into a family of unscrupulous death dealers, baby Alan is born as God’s punishment. He is born with a smile on his lips - and breaks the suicidal way of life in the city. After all, it turns out that life is not such a bad thing, since not everyone wants to go to the next world after being in line. But such a turn of events is a serious threat to business; we need to deal with born optimists. Finally, the third and main feature: Leconte decided to master the art of animation this time. Moreover, he decided to immediately take the bull by the horns and make a movie in 3D. The effect was quite strange: quite advanced technology - and an atmosphere more reminiscent of old French cinema with live actors than modern Americanized animation.

A city with a noose around its neck