It starts incongruously: a young African on a bicycle carries a goat on his back. Are we in the dust of Dakar? The heat of Abidjan? Generic. Sudden change of atmosphere: now, we are on the Causse Méjean, in a farm that smells of dung, misery, cabbage. A woman arrives, makes love with the foul-mouthed evil who hangs out there, and disappears. Two scenes, two countries, two parts of the same story. There will be others. With virtuosity, Dominik Moll and his screenwriter Gilles Marchand reinvent an incredible puzzle game, where the golden rule of fiction applies: “Things are not always what they seem. » False leads, well-hidden secrets, everything happens under the surface.
God is a holy charlatan, proof by Moll
Each time we have the impression of having understood, in fact, we have understood nothing (and it’s delicious). Michel (Denis Ménochet), breeder at the end of his rope, invents a dream life on social networks; Marion, a little waitress in a bar, lives a passion barely shared by Evelyne (played by Valeria Bruni Tedeschi), an older woman; Alice, a social worker, is the victim of a badass with good intentions; Papa Sanou, a haughty marabout somewhere in Africa, works his magic to make the money rain; Cédric, the policeman of the Causse Méjean, runs after a reality that escapes him; Maribé, a lovely young African, dreams of coming to France; Joseph, a rough breeder, lives a passion with a dead woman; Armand, sitting on the beaten floor of a shack, taps on his computer keyboard and invents a multiple entry scam…
In the snow of the high plateaus of the Massif Central, a dark tragedy is unfolding, carried by the wind coming from Saint-Pierre-des-Tripiers and by the clouds that have come from the shores of Senegal. Dominik Moll loves these screens of reality, these toxic dreams. In “Harry, a friend who means well to you” or “Lemming”, the very air breathed by the characters seemed poisonous. Here, the film is broken down into five chapters, five looks, and, yes, a wicked chance has fun fooling everyone. We are in a fascinating game of bonneteau of which we are the delighted pigeons. God is a holy charlatan, proof by Moll.
Thursday, December 29 at 9 p.m. on OCS Choc. French dramatic comedy by Dominik Moll (2019). With Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Nadia Tereszkiewicz. 1h57. (Multicast and On Demand).
