What if Jacques Tati made a film noir? The Falling Star offers a commendable answer to this question, though the final result does not quite live up to such expectations. This is the fifth feature from Belgium-based filmmaking duo Dominique Abel and Fiona Gordon, and an ambitious one at that.
The basic premise concerns Boris (Abel), an activist-in-hiding at a local watering hole who’s finally discovered by a vengeful gunman with a mechanical arm (Bruno Romy). Despite a hilariously bungled assassination attempt, Boris needs to go into hiding once more. Boris, his partner Kayoko (Kaori Ito), and good friend Tim (Philippe Martz) conveniently stumble upon Dom (also Abel), a loner who is Boris’ spitting image. Meanwhile, Fiona (Gordon) is a shy private eye and slightly estranged wife to Dom, burdened with a fracturing marriage and a case of a missing dog. Her emotional distractions spell the dog’s doom. Or does it?
There is plenty of “or does it?” in The Falling Star. The funniest bits are the physical comedy. The least funny bits are the exchanges of dialogue or the overtly political moments, though the latter are perhaps not meant to be a laugh riot. Highlights include a bit where a stretcher holding a character falls down a bunch of stairs off-screen and an extended sequence where somebody frantically cleans a hospital room while the person lying in the hospital bed plots his escape. The best moment by far involves a character sinking into a bean bag chair. It’s funny, it’s unexpected, and it’s a little off-putting.
Everybody here is on the same wavelength, and that kind of collaboration and confidence goes a long way for absurdity. Even still, your mileage may vary. Once the plot is activated, the coincidences become less cute, the messaging less effective. It’s, frankly, the problem with much film noir: the style is the thing while the rest too often breaks the spell. Case in point: production design in The Falling Star is magnificent. Set designer Nico Girault does lovely work with presumably limited resources––the colors pop and the angles are always just a tad askew, suggesting the wild reality we’re living in. As the final act ties everything together a bit tidier than expected, all artifice begins to look artificial.
Romy is very engaging as the gunman who will not go away or hit his target, while Gordon is strangely winning as the aloof detective with huge, adorable glasses. What one will remember from The Falling Star are small things. The way characters get into cars or attempt to fall asleep. The way they pour beer or run from gunfire. For this writer, the small things do not add up to quite enough. Yet when it’s funny, it is really funny.
The Falling Star opens on Friday, August 30.
The post The Falling Star Review: Jacques Tati-Esque Noir Falls Just Short of Absurdist Ambitions first appeared on The Film Stage.
