Our hero in this gloriously dark piece is a depressed, cynical, sexually obsessed systems
engineer moping through life perked up only by the fun he has putting others into a
similarly suicidal state. When he is sent on a work trip to train up clients to use his
company's software he is forced to travel with the slimy Raphael, an unreconstruted male
bursting with such sheer desperation that he is destined never to have success with the
women he chases...
On the trip the pair begin to bond in a very loose fashion since our hero openly hates
Raphael and Raphael tolerates our hero because he has to in order to feel he has a real
friend. The pure bitterness of Philippe Harel, who adapted and directed the film as well
as starring as the lead, is fantastically bleak and raw. He never relents in his mission to
proove that life is futile and wonderful incidents like his stress over trying to buy a bed
illustrate this perfectly. This man lives to make himself and others unhappy.
Raphael, played with admirable sympathy by Jose Garcia tranforms from the ultimate
creep to a tragic figure as we learn more and more about him. Raphael still posesses
huge hope for the future despite the indications that nothing is ever going to go right for
him, which is only reinforced by his travelling companion who he idealises as a sage on
the subject of love and romance on the basis that he has actually managed a relationship
in the past...
The whole film has a blackly glossy look with grotty flats and gloomy weather setting the
mood. That such a miserable film should be so watchable and at times very funny is
something of a surprise. That Raphael also prooves eventually to be suc a moving figure
is totally unexpected. Both Harel's acting and direction are excellent and his choice of
source material seems to suit his eclectic tastes perfectly. This is a very French, very
disposessed look at life for a single man in the modern world. Don't be disheartened by
the high depression content though since here the unhappiness of the characters give
you a feeling of compensatory healthiness and lightness.
