Mortel Transfert
***/****
starring Jean-Hugues Anglade, Helene de Forgerolles, Denis Podalydes
screenplay by Jean-Jacques Beineix, from the novel by Jean-Pierre Gattengo
directed by Jean-Jacques Beineix
by Walter Chaw Returning to the "nouvelle noir" grotesquery that marked his 1981 debut Diva, Jean-Jacques Beineix's Mortal Transfer is wickedly funny, visually stunning, and perverse in a malevolent way that, along with Bernard Rapp's Une affaire de gout, appears to be a Gallic specialty this festival season. Its highlight is a ghoulish, hilarious scene having to do with a corpse, an icy road to be crossed, and a rather unorthodox means of delivery; and though the film never quite seems at ease with its own black heart, its game cast is more than up to the task of the earnest deadpan that Stygian farces require.
Michel Durand (Jean-Hugues Anglade) is a psychiatrist who just isn't very interested in his job. In fact, he finds himself unable to stay awake while his gorgeous patient Olga (Hélène de Fougerolles, recently seen in Va Savoir) talks at length about her own unhealthy exhibitionism and her husband's sadomasochistic impulses. Upon waking during one of their sessions, Michel is horrified to discover that Olga has been murdered, afraid that he might have done it in some somnambulant frenzy. Mortal Transfer troubles itself with Michel's trials in concealing Olga's corpse, in flashbacks that detail Michel's own relationship problems with painter Hélène (Valentina Sauca) and in the unfolding of the mystery behind Olga's disquiet life and violent demise.
Mortal Transfer plays out a bit like After Hours. Most of it takes place at night amongst a bizarre collection of characters and a steadily escalating series of Goldbergian scenarios, with its lead actor even bearing a passing resemblance to Griffin Dunne. The muted look of the film is wonderful, the deep green and blue Paris nightscapes housing long shadows. (The aforementioned "icy street scene" features a tune being passed from stranger to stranger in a way that gracefully recalls Jeunet and Caro's Delicatessen.) Mortal Transfer is clever and polished, a surplus of style over a piffle of substance that's supremely entertaining for all its inconsequence.
