Buffet Froid works like a Samuel Beckett play. It eschews any psychology or background history and simply focuses on absurd situations, thinly linked into what only generously could be called a plot. It's so unpredictable, unconventional and nonsensical it's pointless to describe it. Do people describe Endgame or Waiting for Godot? Using elements from horror and detective fiction, Bertrand Blier crafts a darkly humorous movie about lonely men who wonder whether or not they're killers, of police detectives who don't capture killers and chat with them peacefully. Yes, in words it doesn't sound funny at all, but in Blier's hands it becomes a fascinating movie.
The movie is shot in minimalist terms, with few characters, usually in empty rooms and empty streets, and without using music. Human relationships are strange and fickle, and the natural order of things has ceased to exist. I for one loved the way Blier used silence in the movie, reminding me of the Coens or David Lynch. And his wide shots of peaceful, darkly-lit hallways and streets provoked in me a bigger sense of unease than many serious horror movies.
Anyone wanting a vacation from traditional film-making should watch Buffet Froid and marvel at the strangeness cinema can create when its makers think a bit outside the box.
The movie is shot in minimalist terms, with few characters, usually in empty rooms and empty streets, and without using music. Human relationships are strange and fickle, and the natural order of things has ceased to exist. I for one loved the way Blier used silence in the movie, reminding me of the Coens or David Lynch. And his wide shots of peaceful, darkly-lit hallways and streets provoked in me a bigger sense of unease than many serious horror movies.
Anyone wanting a vacation from traditional film-making should watch Buffet Froid and marvel at the strangeness cinema can create when its makers think a bit outside the box.