<< The French press was almost universally in favour of Mesrine, l’instinct de mort when it was released.  However, Roy rarely got a mention in the reviews, and when he did it was simply a name check.  This article in French monthly magazine Le Causeur at least notices him, although the writer’s take on the film is rather whimsical and laddish.  The translation is a little rocky in parts, and all reference links are mine. – viv >>

Le Causeur
20 January 2009

Mesrine – a hero for our time?

Famous criminals are often idiots

I’ve never understood cinema critics.  Or rarely.  For instance I noticed, with surprise, that Mesrine, l’instinct de mort scored really well.  Really very well.  Only Le Parisien questioned how such crap could be put on our screens. 

It’s not that the film itself is particularly bad.  It’s just boring and an average French production.  No, the real problem is its subject.  Until now, I only knew him by name.  You see, the guy was six feet under before I was even born.  So I was imagining the typical ‘70s gangster.  In other words, for a leading expert like myself, a Spaggiari.

What a disappointment.

Mesrine is a petty criminal.  And not very talented at that.  I’m told he improved in the second film.  Obviously he had plenty of room for improvement.  And, worse than making him simply useless, Cassel plays Mesrine as a half-wit.  So of course, I ask the question.  What’s the proportion of Cassel to Mesrine in this character of a loser who’s neither likeable nor appealing nor anything else besides?

I know what you’re thinking.  Yes, Mesrine may be an idiot.  But he has it off with Cécile de France.  And he’s a buddy of Roy Dupuis.  The guy who was in La Femme Nikita.

Yeah.

That said, it seems to me that it would be difficult to do otherwise. All you can think of doing with Cécile de France is giving her a good seeing to.  It’s a bit like Zidane actually.  You don’t have to take him out on a football pitch.  A tête-à-tête in a restaurant with Zinedine, in my opinion, would be a bit like Cast Away with Tom Hanks – if you see what I mean.  As for hanging out with Roy Dupuis … fine.  He’s a good-looking Canadian lumberjack.

But still.

Anyway, I think that the best moment in the film is the Canadian prison.  Damn it! That’s where you realise that Canadians are to Americans what the Belgians are to us.

You see, you cross the border and find yourself in Fox River, with toilets to unscrew, guards to tie up, Taj Mahals to build, all for a precisely timed, first-rate escape.  While in Canada, in order to get out of jail, you take some wire cutters and, during a walk in the yard, you cut the wire netting and go off into the woods to join the bears.  And that’s it.

If you don’t forget to run, that should do the trick.

Although the best bit is when Mesrine and Roy Dupuis try to rescue their pals from this lousy prison.  Like the world of Buffy before its time.  A brilliant plan.  They take a car.  They speed towards the prison.  They stop at the fence.  They shoot at the watchtowers.  They try to chuck guns to their pals on the other side.

Except the brilliant plan backfires.

Dammit, Roy!  Where did I put the wire cutters?

So I stand corrected.  To escape from a Canadian prison you’ve got to not forget to run and to bring the wire cutters.  Otherwise, when you run, you hit the fence.  And seeing that you’re too big to go through the mesh, you can’t get any further.

Well certainly, this could have a romantic interpretation.  I’m thinking of the astonishing charge in Le Colonel Chabert. But then the Battle of Eylau was a victory. You’ll tell me that, even when it’s a defeat, this type of action can be glorious.  I think of 300 and happily concede.  But then … in 300, I don’t know, there was an idea. Mountains.  A pass.  A strategy.  An objective.

I’m not saying that Mesrine wasn’t brave.  But you have to admit he was also bloody stupid.  Which is perhaps the definition of a famous criminal.  You can’t become famous in this profession unless you’re stupid enough to be caught.  Or to turn yourself in.  That’s why I personally have a problem with criminals who are not unknown to me.  I admire those that I’ve never heard of.  The concealed criminal, you might say.  Who will return one day.  And come and take me from my bed and carry me off with him.

Hmm.

That’s also why I didn’t have posters of known felons in my bedroom as a kid.