the pathetic caverns - movies by title - L'Appartement

eclectic reviews and opinions

A French premiere called L'Appartement was one of the most fun movies at the '97 Sundance festival. It stars Vincent Cassel (with more hair than he had as a skinhead in Hate last year) as a callow fellow who's supposed to travel to Tokyo on business, but at the last minute he skips the flight when he spots an old girlfriend who had disappeared. The story seems like a trifle at the outset, then becomes an increasingly complicated thriller, using Hitchcockian motifs like action glimpsed through the apartment window across the courtyard (Rear Window) and constant scenes of tailing women around the city (Vertigo). Plus, it has the always enigmatic Romane Bohringer. After the movie I asked director Gilles Mimouni, who was so daunted by the crowd that he was barely audible, why he included all the obvious Hitchcock stuff and he said "I wanted to make a sentimental romance." Huh? This one will do quite well here, I think.

© 1997 Will Heyniger

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