Trouble Every Day (2001)

Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

Just perfect...

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

Another word (to me) for pretentious could be boring, or maybe dull, because when a film tries too hard to have hidden depths sometimes it just plunges deep into the abyss. This is where Trouble Every Day dwells.I heard about the movie while reading a horror encyclopedia somewhere so I thought I'd track it down. I'm no newbie when it comes to challenging horror cinema and I actively seek out things which my local multiplex wouldn't show. I also don't mind if a film moves relatively slowly, but it takes a few morsels of plot along the way to smoulder my interest, Trouble Every Day fails to keep that interest and it's almost as if the director thought he could pad out 90% of the film with any dreary old shots because we wanted to see the reported shocking ending. I'm afraid not though.When it finally gets to the good stuff, its a damp squib. So much more could have been done with the entire premise, much like Let The Right One In. The (little) gore is not really that shocking and at times you don't even know what's going on. All in all, it's just not that good of a film and it's no great wonder it doesn't get much recognition. I would have given it a 2 but I liked the theme music so a generous 3 then.

Claire Denis, professor of film at the famous "La Femis" University in Paris, is a world-known very controversial film maker, obviously disposing on a repertoire of film that starts at the time of Lumiere and does not stop on its trip around the world. So, it is senseless to ask for possible inspirations. If she had, she combined all the elements so artistically that the result is a new whole thing: a truly unique film, but, admittedly, not a film for everybody.The director shows a minutes long detailed raping scene between the characters played by Vincent Gallo and Florence Loiret, during which she is partially eaten up by the blood-thirsty newly-wed (former?)scientist with doctoral degree. Not even Catherine Breillat has reached such an intensity in a very similar scene of one of her more recent movies. After all, I have to say that "Trouble every day" is much more graphic, intense, gory and bloody than, f.ex. Pasolini's "Salo". Thus, the question arises, why Pasolini's film is banned practically in the whole world except the US and why "Trouble every day" is not. The possible answer: People realize that in "Salo", the director actually meant what he was showing and telling his audience, while in Claire Denis' movie, the bloody, brutal, dark and somewhat cold pictures sometimes strike a humorist dimension - however, in a place where humor normally is absent."Trouble every day" with his completely misleading title, possibly also inspired by humor, shows a highly artistic way of dealing with subjects that we have no chance to meet in this form in our world, thus disclosing by the signs of the pictures which constitute this film a metaphysical reality which is a fully imaginary as well as imaginative construct. However, in exactly this way, Claire Denis meets with Pasolini, and hence the intention of the two directors is the only thing that differs basically (abstracting from the different superficial story-lines of the two movies, of course). The bloody and dirty background of humankind seems to be allowed to be shown only transposed into a clearly identifiable world of signs which is detached form "reality". But do we not perceive "reality" only interpreted by our senses? Is thus reality not necessarily always a construct? -Therefore, is it true that Claire Denis' world cannot hurt you as Pasolini's world can?

On a honeymoon in Paris with his beautiful wife, an American man heads to the home of an exiled medical professional, Léo (Alex Descas), who specializes in the field that Shane (Vincent Gallo) has been involved with: The Human Libido. At Léo's home, Shane meets Léo's wife, Coré (Béatrice Dalle of 'À l'intérieur'), who is kept locked away from the world due to her carnivorous carnal tendencies. The secrets and events that follow will be the most shocking and horrifying of the young couple's lives.Hearing that this film borders on unlikable due to the subject matter, I had to pounce on the opportunity to view it. Expecting a truly shocking and disturbing French horror. . . I was not disappointed. The depth of exploration of sexuality and cannibalism (and the sexuality OF cannibalism) goes unmatched by any single film I've ever seen. While it's not a film that is particularly enjoyable, as it does reach some limits that are unusual for modern cinema of this style, it's still beautifully made and extremely fascinating. The entire cast delivers at least above-adequate performances, some better than others (include Béatrice Dalle in the 'better' category as usual). Like another recent film of Dalle's, 'Trouble Every Day'f features an extremely cringeworthy scene that sent chills up and down my spine. It's not nearly as graphic in a sense of quantity as I'd expected, but the quality of the brutality is what makes the film so effective.Final Verdict: 8/10.-AP3-

From what I've read of him, I do not like Vincent Gallo as a person, and he often physically repulses me. In Trouble Every Day, he does physically repulse me more than ever, yet I do not dislike him in his role. What I must say impresses me about Gallo is his ability as an actor, including performances under his own writing and direction, to play roles devoid of any of the ego that he defensively projects what I've read of his off-screen life and that are crippled by hopeless insecurity and apprehension, which he showcases without a hint of inhibition or unintended uneasiness. That is why I believe he continues to find work in movies in spite of the unbelievable amount of projects from which he was fired or walked away, the amount of people he claims to hate, and the mind-blowingly infuriated critical and audience reaction to his sophomore effort at the helm, The Brown Bunny. All-embracing filmmakers see him as one of the very few actors who has no problem baring himself for a performance as a truly pathetic character. In this film, he is honeymooning with his wife in Paris superficially in an effort to nurture their new life together, however the core reason is so that he can visit a medical clinic where studies of the human libido are undertaken. He hopes to rid himself of the bloodthirsty urges that have always plagued him.The real shock found in this film is my surprise introduction to Beatrice Dalle, who I have never before seen in a movie and near whom I hope to be wearing football gear inside the Batmobile if I ever see her in person. As a doctor's wife who is psychologically in ruins due to a mysterious overextention of her libido and is too dangerous for her husband to let her free from the bedroom during the day, she reaches as deeply into the most basic appetitive animal instincts as she is capable and plainly ensues as a nightmarish monster of berserk chaos. It was clever of writer/director Claire Denis to cast two notoriously wild atypical people of extremity in their roles.Denis's scenes of gore, which due to her focus on the morose feelings of the characters, mainly Gallo, his wife, and Dalle are intermittent and often difficult to anticipate, are extremely disturbing. During a scene where Dalle attacks a person's flesh as they lay in shock, barely able to scream, the sounds made by both Dalle and her victim are heard just barely over the glum, cheerlessly jazzy score. In the other scenes of violence, Denis's wise discerning between the appropriate placement or absence of music asserts a very moving outcome.Though I was expecting a grittier cinematographic delivery, the film is stirring, well made, and metaphorically interpretable.