Film: Mesrine: Killer Instincts (Part 1)
Cast includes: Vincent Cassel (Ocean’s Twelve & Thirteen), Gérard Depardieu (Cyrano de Bergerac), Gilles Lellouche (Tell No One), Elena Anaya (Cairo Time)
Director: Jean-François Richet (All About Love, Assault on Precinct 13)
Genre: Crime/Biography/Drama, based on an autobiographical novel by Jacques Mesrine (2008) French with subtitles
In brief: Jacques Mesrine earned his nasty attitude in Algiers, 1959. We only see a brief episode there, but it’s not pretty. When he returns to France, he finds that his father has gotten him a job in a lace factory… a good job with a good future. But his old friend, Paul, seems to be doing quite well… odd jobs, off the books… and they’re hiring. Jacques seems to have a talent for “odd jobs” and soon gets a meeting with Guido, the head of the operation. Guido is impressed. Jacques and Paul are golden… the money, the women, the action. Jacques even makes an attempt at domestic bliss when he marries Sofia and fathers 3 children. But he just isn’t cut out to be a family man.
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From here, we see some of the events that are part of the Mesrine legend… armed bank robberies, kidnappings, murders and prison breaks… 4 of them. When he teams up with Jeanne for some high-profile bank robberies in Canada, the pair is dubbed Bonnie & Clyde. But we see no lovable qualities in this Bonnie & Clyde duo. In fact, Mesrine makes most American gangsters look mellow by comparison. The one quality we see in Mesrine that does remind us of Clyde is his obsession with his legend. He stages his crimes for maximum media attention.
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Jacques Mesrine’s life and legend were so big that a single movie couldn’t make a dent. That’s why it’s been divided into two movies, and they’ve only scratched the surface. In this one (Part 1), they show us a prison break from La Santé in Canada. Sentenced to 20 years, Mesrine escaped after just a year. While in prison, he wrote L’Instinct de Mort, a partial autobiography, which he smuggled out and had published.
As a narrative, the storyline in the film is a bit too complicated, even though there was an obvious attempt to pare it down. It’s the nature of films based on true stories… especially a story like the life of Jacques Mesrine… especially if you’re trying to avoid simply glorifying a violent criminal. The film is beautifully made, and Vincent Cassel as Mesrine is amazing. In his criminal career, Mesrine was dubbed “The Man of a Hundred Faces.” While this film doesn’t delve deeply into Mesrine’s disguises, Vincent Cassel successfully shows us many faces of the Mesrine persona… from heart-throbbingly sensuous to deeply disturbed. According to Mesrine, “Nobody kills me until I say so.” …at least not in Part 1. Part 2, Mesrine: Public Enemy No. 1, gives us the other half of the story.
3 popped kernels
Vincent Cassel’s performance is truly amazing. While the story is a bit disjointed, the film is very compelling.
Popcorn Profile
Primary Audience: Grown-ups
Gender Appeal: Any audience
Distribution: Art house
Mood: Neither upbeat nor somber
Tempo: Zips right along
Visual Style: Nicely varnished realism
Character Development: Engaging
Language: True to life
Social Significance: Informative and entertaining
