Throughout April 2005

www.Montrealfilmjournal.com – unsigned – 3 stars (out of 4, so add another half)

[ … ] Albert spends much of the film lost in the Arizona desert, appropriately dressed as Valentino's Sheik. With a womanising professional golfer (Roy Dupuis, very funny) at his side, he wanders through endless sand dunes, encountering colourful characters like a sexy Mexican dancer and her creepy "choreographer" (Marc Labrèche) and an asthmatic woman (Céline Bonnier) whose husband lives in a boat on top of a pole. There's also a nice little romance between Albert and Grace Carson (the always adorable Émilie Dequenne), a militant Mormon feminist.

André Forcier, who wrote and directed the movie, is a unique creature in Quebec cinema. While most of his colleagues are mostly concerned with either navel-gazing auteur film or crassly commercial product, Forcier dares to have vision and ambition. His latest is full of inventive mise en scène and the screenplay is as clever as it can be absurd. The bumpy storytelling and the stylized performances will turn off some people (I saw a few critics walk out), but I'm glad there's still place for fantasy and goofiness on our screens. [ … ]

Journal de Québec – Denise Martel – 3 ½ stars

[ … ] The acting direction is excellent. Particularly memorable are young Éric Bruneau, who is amazing in his first professional role, along with Andréa Férréol who creates an almost Machiavellian character, and of course Roy Dupuis, who brings poetry to the desert. While not the best of Forcier’s films, Les États-Unis d’Albert is more like Une histoire inventée and Le vent du Wyoming than La comtesse de Bâton Rouge and Kalamazoo.

(But compare this with  Juliette Ruer in ICI  who says :
If you need to place it in [Forcier’s] filmography, this film is less unhinged than Acapulco Gold (the outrageous Franco-Hispanic Elvis), but less frenetic and anguished than Une histoire inventée , Le vent du Wyoming, or Au clair de la lune. It’s closer to La comtesse de Bâton Rouge in wanting to go down to the States in pursuit of an ideal, to discuss women and films.)

Journal de Montréal – Paul Villeneuve – 3 ½ stars

[ …] To play all these strange characters who speak with different accents recalling American films dubbed in France, Forcier called upon experienced actors such as Roy Dupuis, who gives a solid performance, but he also entrusts the leading role in his film to a drama student. It must be said that risk is part of Forcier’s work. Nevertheless, Éric Bruneau, who plays the part of Albert, rises well to the challenge.

www.radio-canada.ca – Michel Coulombe  - 3 stars

[ …] Made like a road movie, Les États-Unis d’Albert associates each stage in Albert’s journey with a character. The inspector, the militant Mormon, Miss USA, the womanising golfer. He deals mostly with lonely or isolated people. Each one reveals a facet of their personality to this young man, simultaneously naïve and opportunistic, loving and violent, who imagines himself as Valentino’s successor. The nouveau sheik. [ … ]

La Presse – Luc Perreault – 3 stars

[ … ] Part of the difficulty watching this film comes from the discrepancies in the dialogue. We know that originally the film was meant to be made in English. Production problems prevented the filmmaker from carrying out this plan. As a Canada-France-Switzerland co-production, it was condemned to French. We understand and applaud the idea of having the characters (except for Albert) talking as though they were in a dubbed American film. But, just as Quebec dubbing is often underrated compared with its European equivalent, the prize here goes to the two Frenchwomen << Andréa Férréol and Émilie Dequenne >>. You search in vain to find the same authenticity in the speech of their Quebecois colleagues. As for the annoying Yiddish accent that Céline Bonnier tries to imitate, it borders on being downright ridiculous. [ … ]