"L'inconnu du lac" or "Stranger by the Lake" has made quite a few waves in Cannes this year, including a Director win in the certain regard category for Alain Guiraudie. When I watched the film earlier today, I wasn't really sure what to expect at all. I did see the trailer earlier, but judging from that it could have developed into all kinds of directions. What it did turn out to be in the end was a pretty good crime thriller and I really liked a lot that we only see everything that happens at the lake. There's character development beyond that, for example Franck and Henri meeting for dinner, but the fact that our knowledge of the situations and characters is restricted exclusively to everything that happens at the beach lends this 100-minute movie a very special and extremely tense atmosphere from the moment the crime factor comes into play.
The film's central character is portrayed by Pierre Deladonchamps as an openly homosexual male who regularly visits a beach frequented mostly by gay men looking for adventures and, one day, he sees another big strong man, who reminded me of the young Tom Selleck in Magnum, and who he is immediately attracted to. When the two get closer, dark shadows get in the way of their togetherness. While the tension rises as the film moves on, it's sexually explicit from the very beginning. There's naked men from start to finish, frequently having sex and on one or two occasions we even see close-up shots of erect penises and ejaculation. If this does not bother you, it's a movie very much worth watching, especially for Patrick d'Assumçao's excellent supporting performance as a previously-married man who recently found his true sexuality. The vulnerability he displayed in his scenes had my eyes glued to the screen. You have to dig really deep to find flaws with it and while the ending may not be for everybody, I liked it as well. On a side note, you don't find too many very famous films that feature an exclusively male cast, but this one here could fit the category when it makes its way around theaters and living rooms all across the world and rises in popularity in the next couple years.
There's a whole lot of gay-movies (although I don't really like that term, as this is certainly one for straight audiences as well) coming out every year, but most of these fall in the short film category, which is a very popular genre for films centering on homosexuality, coming-outs etc. Here is finally a full feature on the issue and even better it's one that is very much worth watching.
The film's central character is portrayed by Pierre Deladonchamps as an openly homosexual male who regularly visits a beach frequented mostly by gay men looking for adventures and, one day, he sees another big strong man, who reminded me of the young Tom Selleck in Magnum, and who he is immediately attracted to. When the two get closer, dark shadows get in the way of their togetherness. While the tension rises as the film moves on, it's sexually explicit from the very beginning. There's naked men from start to finish, frequently having sex and on one or two occasions we even see close-up shots of erect penises and ejaculation. If this does not bother you, it's a movie very much worth watching, especially for Patrick d'Assumçao's excellent supporting performance as a previously-married man who recently found his true sexuality. The vulnerability he displayed in his scenes had my eyes glued to the screen. You have to dig really deep to find flaws with it and while the ending may not be for everybody, I liked it as well. On a side note, you don't find too many very famous films that feature an exclusively male cast, but this one here could fit the category when it makes its way around theaters and living rooms all across the world and rises in popularity in the next couple years.
There's a whole lot of gay-movies (although I don't really like that term, as this is certainly one for straight audiences as well) coming out every year, but most of these fall in the short film category, which is a very popular genre for films centering on homosexuality, coming-outs etc. Here is finally a full feature on the issue and even better it's one that is very much worth watching.