Belgian director Fabrice Du Welz has a singularly unusual, and frequently disturbing, view of humanity that translates into some truly unsettling films. Anyone who has seen his 2004 film Calvaire and walked away unscathed can attest to this. Sort of a Belgian Lars Von Trier, he's an auteur with an astonishing eye for visual imagery, determined to use startling and frequently beautiful camerawork to show viewers a dark side of humanity that lies behind doors we would probably prefer remain closed.
2009's Vinyan is no exception. Not as outright crazy nor jaw-droppingly shocking as Calvaire, it is nonetheless a harrowing journey that examines themes of parenthood, tribalism, and Eastern/Western dichotomies. Vinyan stars Rufus Sewell and Emmanuelle Béart as Paul and Jeanne Bellmer, a married couple living in Thailand, trying to deal with the disappearance of their son months ago. Paul is slowly coming to a grim acceptance, while Jeanne is...
2009's Vinyan is no exception. Not as outright crazy nor jaw-droppingly shocking as Calvaire, it is nonetheless a harrowing journey that examines themes of parenthood, tribalism, and Eastern/Western dichotomies. Vinyan stars Rufus Sewell and Emmanuelle Béart as Paul and Jeanne Bellmer, a married couple living in Thailand, trying to deal with the disappearance of their son months ago. Paul is slowly coming to a grim acceptance, while Jeanne is...
- 4/8/2010
- by TK
After his controversial and much-debated Calvaire, director Fabrice Du Welz leaves the Belgian backwoods and Deliverance territory behind for the jungles of Southeast Asia. Vinyan (coming on DVD from Sony Pictures April 7) is likely to prove just as polarizing to viewers, and while the film has its share of shortcomings, I found myself drawn into this haunting, hallucinatory journey into the heart of darkness.
“Heart of darkness” is an apropos term, as Vinyan not only recalls Joseph Conrad’s symbolic story, but Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola’s loose but equally allegorical film adaptation of that 1902 novel. Six months after losing their only child in the Southeast tsunami, Jeanne (Emmanuelle Béart) and Paul (Rufus Sewell) are watching a documentary about orphans living in the Burmese jungles when Jeanne stops the film. She is convinced that a boy in a Manchester United shirt is their son Josh. Paul is initially skeptical,...
“Heart of darkness” is an apropos term, as Vinyan not only recalls Joseph Conrad’s symbolic story, but Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola’s loose but equally allegorical film adaptation of that 1902 novel. Six months after losing their only child in the Southeast tsunami, Jeanne (Emmanuelle Béart) and Paul (Rufus Sewell) are watching a documentary about orphans living in the Burmese jungles when Jeanne stops the film. She is convinced that a boy in a Manchester United shirt is their son Josh. Paul is initially skeptical,...
- 3/18/2009
- Fangoria
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