God is great… and I’m not
Picture:
C+ Sound: B- Extras: C- Film: C+
When
22-year-old model Michele (Audrey Tautou) and Francois (Edouard Baer) fall for
each other, she begins to try and change her ways, eventually with a suddenly
obsessive study of Judaism (after attempts at Catholicism and Buddhism) in God is great… and I’m not (2002), the
religion of Francois’ family. They are
puzzled because they are not very strong devotees themselves to begin with.
She has
not always been the most honest girl and also has a family that we could
consider rather dysfunctional. Too bad
the film is not more about those relationships, because the cute debates about
religion and love are obvious and get played out surprisingly fast. Director Pascale Bailly knows he has a star
in Tautou and exploits her image accordingly, but the effect is not as
effective as Happenstance (reviewed
elsewhere on this site), which this film seems to be trying to emulate, though
not as obnoxious as Amelie.
It gets
even odder when it is suggested whether she is an anti-Semite, which totally
clashes with the rest of the film, as if it thinks this is funny and brings it
above the cutesy comedy it is otherwise.
There is some humor in someone’s insecurity about how they feel about others,
about strangers, but that cannot distract enough from the more obvious and even
formulaic aspects of the film.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image is not as impressive as expected, looking
like a degrade Dogme ’95 video by Stéphane Malca, and
strongly shot that way on video of some kind.
The final release prints were on Kodak film, but if they were shot that
way, it absolutely does not look like it.
This is more likely either analog SECAM or SECAM-C video, DV or HD. The sound is available in both Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
with Pro Logic surround and slightly better 5.1 AC-3, but it turns out the film
was a DTS release, though the credits seem to indicate only their analog
matrixed surround version was used.
Extras include text interviews with the director and two leads, a stills
gallery and the original trailer.
If
anything struck me as anti-Semitic, it just might be the trivialization of
Judaism the film drifts into unintentionally.
That further hurts a film that is already having problems accusing a
character of such a thing. It may be
playing too loose with the abortion issue as well. The cover picture for the DVD and endless
promotion has Tautou looking sideways to the sky (to “God” supposedly) and
holing a candle burning in her hand. It
is the silliest such image we have seen in years, but the film does not quite
match it. This is only for the most
curious.
- Nicholas Sheffo
