There is a term for the sparsely populated swath of France that extends southwest from the borders of Belgium and Luxembourg to the Pyrenees: the “empty diagonal” (“diagonale du vide“). Evocative of rural flight and small-town decline, the phrase was the title of French director Hubert Charuel‘s 2011 short film, set in his native Saint-Dizier to which Charuel and writing partner Claude Le Pape now return for his second feature. Premiering in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section, “Meteors” summons rather too well that empty, diagonal spirit, following the downward slide of no-hoper characters with nothing much going on, and certainly nothing good.
A briefly buzzy beginning during a rowdy boys’ night at the bowling alley introduces us to Mika (Paul Kircher), Daniel (Idir Azougli) and Tony (Salif Cissé), three childhood friends now in their mid-to-late twenties continuing slacker lifestyles and drunken bonding rituals that apparently haven’t changed much since their teens. Tony, however, is establishing a small waste-disposal business and as the most entrepreneurial of the three, is absent for much of the film, which is far more involved in the unhealthily co-dependent relationship between besties Mika and Daniel.
Mika is the slightly more sensible one, working a job at Burger King and trying, if not to escape exactly, then at least to keep his nose clean enough that he won’t be wholly trapped here should the opportunity for escape arise. Daniel is another story, full of drunkenly conceived, hare-brained, get-rich-quick schemes of dodgy legality, the dumbest of which — the spontaneous kidnapping of a neighbor’s pedigree Maine Coon cat — lands both him and reluctant getaway driver Mika in trouble with the local authorities. During the fallout from this inane episode, which like the duo’s bizarre scheme of moving to Madagascar to look after street dogs Charuel plays straight and flat despite the potential for a touch of zany, Coen-Brothers energy, it is further discovered that Daniel is in such a state of advanced alcoholism that his liver is on the verge of collapse. But while Mika frets over him, Daniel himself ploughs on heedlessly, and eventually they both go to work with Tony, who has just landed a big job at the nearby nuclear waste plant. Having the ailing, unstable, untrained Daniel around a bunch of radioactive trash goes about as well as you might expect.
In the absence of strong, forward-thrusting plot mechanics or a setting that, despite some nice shotmaking and a few surreal flourishes from DP Jacques Girault, cannot be described as anything but dismal, this kind of loose buddy-hangout drama really pivots on the chemistry between the characters. Unfortunately, while the talented cast are all committed to their underdog roles, there is — again — an emptiness in the screenplay with regards to their intertwined histories, for which no performance niceties can quite compensate. It’s especially obvious with Daniel, who should be the film’s tragic figure — the archetype of the fun-loving goofball whose hard-partying, hedonistic youth has metastasized into life-threatening addiction. But as written, Daniel displays little of the magnetism and conviviality that can inspire more grounded individuals to become so protective of their self-destructive friends. And without a real sense of the origin and nature of their bond, it’s a bit of a mystery why Mika remains so devoted to this millstone round his neck, and so doggedly determined to save him, when Daniel doesn’t seem remotely interested in saving himself.
Without much else to connect it to, one assumes we’re meant to take the film’s title as a poetic reference to lives that burn brightly and briefly before disintegrating, but “Meteors” is all disintegration, no burn. And while the mood of disaffection is powerful — even mordant comments about this being a town where the garbage men deliver rather than collect have the vibe of jokes worn thin through repetition — it’s also a downer, with little levity or vitality to make the inevitable descent toward friendship’s end more stark and therefore more moving. Charuel’s investment in this story of wasted, marginalized youth is noble and clearly heartfelt, but “Meteors” grasps for a poignancy that always remains out of reach, and so here all those good intentions, in a manner unlikely to win him any tourist-board gigs, just pave the way to Saint-Dizier.
variety.com
#Listless #French #Drama #SmallTown #Disaffection
