★☆☆☆☆ Writer-director Jérôme Le Gris' debut feature Requiem for a Killer (2011) is a laughably bad thriller from beginning to end, focusing on the last days of a pseudo-femme-fatal Lucrèce (Mélanie Laurent). Tired of being a gun for hire, Lucrèce agrees to take one last job before she can devote her time with her eight-year-old daughter. Whisked away to a châteaux in Switzerland, Lucrèce must masquerade as an opera singer in order to kill vocalist Alex (Christopher Stills).
Read more »...
Read more »...
- 7/3/2012
- by CineVue
- CineVue
Jérôme Le Gris's first film as writer-director is a homage to Hitchcock centring on a French special forces officer sent to kill Lucrèce, a beautiful French assassin, whose last mission is to murder a British baritone performing Handel's Messiah at a Swiss chateau. Her employer is a British oil company that aims to build a pipeline on his land in the Highlands. A precocious French schoolboy's idea of sophistication, the film is as deep and as brittle as a coating of glossy nail varnish.
ThrillerDramaWorld cinemaPhilip French
guardian.co.uk © 2012 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds...
ThrillerDramaWorld cinemaPhilip French
guardian.co.uk © 2012 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds...
- 6/16/2012
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
Rock Of Ages (12A)
(Adam Shankman, 2012, Us) Julianne Hough, Diego Boneta, Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand, Paul Giamatti, Catherine Zeta-Jones. 123 mins
Doing for 1980s hair metal what Mamma Mia! did for Abba, this glossy musical gives you the broad pleasures of pantomime rather than rock'n'roll danger, with theatrical star turns and a playlist of power ballads hung around an archetypal tale of a smalltown girl and a wannabe rock star boy on La's Sunset Strip. You can stop believin' now.
Cosmopolis (15)
(David Cronenberg, 2012, Fra/Can/Por/Ita) Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, Sarah Gadon. 109 mins
Don De Lillo's prescient novella makes for a cool Manhattan odyssey, centred on Pattinson's jaded banker and the Occupy zeitgeist.
Polisse (15)
(Maïwenn, 2011, Fra) Karin Viard, Joey Starr, Marina Foïs. 128 mins
A Wire-like approach to a French child protection unit reaps dividends for this docu-style procedural.
Red Lights (15)
(Rodrigo Cortés, 2012, Us/Spa) Cillian Murphy, Robert De Niro,...
(Adam Shankman, 2012, Us) Julianne Hough, Diego Boneta, Tom Cruise, Alec Baldwin, Russell Brand, Paul Giamatti, Catherine Zeta-Jones. 123 mins
Doing for 1980s hair metal what Mamma Mia! did for Abba, this glossy musical gives you the broad pleasures of pantomime rather than rock'n'roll danger, with theatrical star turns and a playlist of power ballads hung around an archetypal tale of a smalltown girl and a wannabe rock star boy on La's Sunset Strip. You can stop believin' now.
Cosmopolis (15)
(David Cronenberg, 2012, Fra/Can/Por/Ita) Robert Pattinson, Juliette Binoche, Sarah Gadon. 109 mins
Don De Lillo's prescient novella makes for a cool Manhattan odyssey, centred on Pattinson's jaded banker and the Occupy zeitgeist.
Polisse (15)
(Maïwenn, 2011, Fra) Karin Viard, Joey Starr, Marina Foïs. 128 mins
A Wire-like approach to a French child protection unit reaps dividends for this docu-style procedural.
Red Lights (15)
(Rodrigo Cortés, 2012, Us/Spa) Cillian Murphy, Robert De Niro,...
- 6/15/2012
- by Steve Rose
- The Guardian - Film News
★★☆☆☆ While she certainly kicked ass as the fearsome femme fatale in Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Bastards (2009), Mélanie Laurent has always seemed more comfortable in dramatic fare like The Concert and Beginners, especially when faced with thrillers as cliché-added and generic as Requiem for a Killer (2011). Though she admirably acquits herself in the lead role, Jérôme Le Gris' film, sumptuously shot though it is, lazily rehashes previous girl-with-a-gun narratives.
Read more »...
Read more »...
- 6/14/2012
- by CineVue
- CineVue
Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
Though Mélanie Laurent might be best known to English-speaking audiences for her head-turning femme fatale in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, she’s still not the first face you’d pick for a genre-keen thriller like Requiem for a Killer. Oddball casting aside – given that Laurent, much better suited to character-driven drama, tries hard to convince – Jérôme Le Gris’s elegantly-shot hit-woman procedural falters due to rote plotting and an almost complete lack of tension.
On the plus side, Gris doesn’t hang about. Right from the opening scene, assassin Lucrèce (Laurent) is on the job, staging a meticulously planned murder by poisoning a ceremonial wafer during a church mass. When it threatens to wind up in the mouth of an innocent, she has to spring into action. It is a markedly suspenseful scene with which to begin a film, but unfortunately one which makes each subsequent exchange,...
Though Mélanie Laurent might be best known to English-speaking audiences for her head-turning femme fatale in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, she’s still not the first face you’d pick for a genre-keen thriller like Requiem for a Killer. Oddball casting aside – given that Laurent, much better suited to character-driven drama, tries hard to convince – Jérôme Le Gris’s elegantly-shot hit-woman procedural falters due to rote plotting and an almost complete lack of tension.
On the plus side, Gris doesn’t hang about. Right from the opening scene, assassin Lucrèce (Laurent) is on the job, staging a meticulously planned murder by poisoning a ceremonial wafer during a church mass. When it threatens to wind up in the mouth of an innocent, she has to spring into action. It is a markedly suspenseful scene with which to begin a film, but unfortunately one which makes each subsequent exchange,...
- 6/11/2012
- by Shaun Munro
- Obsessed with Film
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.