Sur la Plage:
"All tech credits pro," as Daily Variety was wont to
say, Tilda's very good (in an underwritten part), Virginie
Ledoyen is babe-a-licious as ever (in a virtually unwritten part),
and Leo is Leo. So if you're one of the millions of girls who
mooned over him in "Titanic" and still have some
mooning left in you -- here's your movie.
I never read the novel, but from what I understand the hero is
British and there's no romance involved. But there's hardly any
in here either -- because it's all about narcissism. All-American
narcissism.
The plot(do I really need to screm "spoilers!!?) has Leo
arriving in Bangkok and learning from an insane Robert Carlyle of
an island paradise. After topping himself, Caryle leaves him a
map. Leo asks the couple in the room next door (Ledoyen and her
boyfriend, the equally cute Guillaume Canet) if they want to come
along, and they do. What they discover is a marijuana farm tended
by heavily armed Thai farmers, and a commune that's exactly like
Club Med.
If Club Med is your idea of paradise then this is your movie.
It sure as hell isn't mine. Nothing to do but play volleyball and
fish. No literature. No doctors (!) Someone has a guitar so they
can all sing folk songs. No one of even so much as passing
interest living there.
It all comes to grief thanks to Leo's bumbling. He lets a
bunch of American stoners know about the place and when they show
up all heck breaks loose. And that's only the worst of the
problems he causes. His character is a COMPLETE ASSHOLE, yet
we're obliged to regard him as the hero-- a sensitive young man
who's searching, searching searching!
GACK!
"Damned Kids!" (etc. etc.)
