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THE MACHINE
A much dumber than average brain-switch chiller from France. It contains one shocking sequence but is otherwise fatally clichéd and inert.
The Package
If you’ve
seen John Woo’s FACE/OFF, made three years later, then you’ll have the gist of
1994’s THE MACHINE (LA MACHINE). Adapted from the novel Rene Belleto and
written and directed by Francois Dupeyron (MONSIEUR IBRAHIM), it’s a seriously
silly project that somehow managed to attract three of France’s top actors:
Gerard Depardieu, Nathalie Baye and Claude Berri. Not that it matters.
The Story
Dr. Lacroix
is a psychiatrist who’s invented a mind-sharing machine. He becomes obsessed
with one of his patients, a compulsive murderer named Michel. For some reason
Lacroix decides to use his machine to share minds with Michel, and their brains
are switched. Michel, in Lacroix’s body, quickly gets the upper hand, getting
Lacroix, stuck in Michel’s body, locked up. In his new guise Michel wreaks
havoc with Lacroix’s wife and son--being apparent morons, the latter two don’t
recognize that their husband/father has changed until it’s too late.
When it becomes apparent that Michel won’t be able to pretend to be Lacroix
much longer, he drags the latter’s young son to the machine and switches bodies
with him. The boy then returns home and cold-bloodedly plots the murder
of his mother, who once again doesn’t recognize her son’s odd behavior until
it’s too late.
The Direction
This film
suffers from bland and inert filmmaking, only really coming to life during a
startlingly graphic murder sequence. Even the final body switch twist (given
away by the opening of the film, depicting Lacroix’s son planning a murder) has
no impact. The film’s biggest problem, however, is that the narrative is a
ridiculous hodgepodge that makes little sense--among other things, the
protagonist’s fascination with the killer (and why he’d want to meld minds with
him) is never made clear.
None of the characters are well developed, and the actors do nothing to
alleviate this problem. Gerard Depardieu and Didier Bourdon could have livened
things up when playing each other following the brain switch (Depardieu at least
is fully capable), but for some reason chose to act largely the same as they did
before the swap. I’ll say this: their anemic performances perfectly fit the
tone of the rest of this terminally unexciting project.
Vital Statistics
THE MACHINE (LA MACHINE)
France 2 Cinema/Hachette
Premiere/M6 Films/Prima/Studio Babelsberg
Director: Francois Dupeyron
Producer: Patrick Bordier, Bernard Bouix, Rene Cleitman, Ingrid Windisch
Screenplay: Francois Dupeyron
Cinematography: Dietrich Lohmann
Editing: Noelle Boisson
Cast: Gerard Depardieu, Nathalie Baye,
Didier Bourdon, Natalia Worner, Erwan Baynaud, Claude Berri, Marc Andreoni,
Alain Azerot, Wilfred Benaiche,
Christian Bujeau, Julie Depardieu