FEUX ROUGES
RED LIGHTS
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Director:
Cedric Kahn
Screenplay: Cedric Kahn, Laurence Ferreira-Barbosa,
Gilles Marchand, based on the novel by Georges Simenon.
Cast:
Antoine: Jean-Pierre Darroussin
Hélène: Carole Bouquet
Man on the run: Vincent Déniard
Running time: 105'
Year of production: France - 2004
Rating: Not rated (violence)
Gauge: 35mm, DVD (color)
Distributor: New Yorker Films
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“Sustains
an appearance of realism even while embracing symbolic
and surreal elements. Its eeriness is enhanced by its
soundtrack’s repetition of excerpts from Debussy’s
“Nuages”... Red Lights owes much to Alfred
Hitchcock’s gallows humor.” Stephen Holden,
The New York Times |
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Hélène
and Antoine leave sweltering Paris to pick up their children
at a countryside summer camp. Antoine, an insurance company
employee, is looking forward to this escapade and sees it
as an opportunity to patch up their troubled marriage. He
is a heavy drinker and fortifies himself with plenty of alcohol
before hitting the road. Hélène, a successful
and savvy corporate attorney, is disgruntled and annoyed by
Antoine’s every move. Caught in traffic jams and the
hot sun, tense arguments quickly arise. Antoine’s brusque
and dangerous driving is aggravated by his constant drinking
as he stops regularly at roadside bars for whisky shots. Hélène
refuses to join him for drinks and finally leaves him a note
saying that she will continue the journey by train. After
more drinks and unsuccessful attempts to catch up with his
wife, Antoine, frustrated and angry, picks up a spooky hitchhiker.
With numerous twists and turns, suspense builds: Has Hélène
safely arrived at the camp? Is the hitchhiker also the escaped
prisoner he has been hearing about on the radio? Or, as Cédric
Kahn ambiguously suggests, has he drunk so much that he is
just having a nightmare?
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| PHOTO New
Yorker Films |
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