Notes of a Desolate Libra

I knew I shouldn't have tried to watch a French film....

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="230" caption="Vidocq"]

I've never claimed to be cultured. In fact, many of my friends know I stay away from artsy fartsy places... and the same goes for movies. French movies are tricky. On the one hand, they tend to be artsy by definition, but there are also beauties like Amélie and some years ago I watched District B13 and was blown away by the action and art direction. Besides, the movie was about Vidocq and I'm a real sucker for detectives and mysteries in general (that's why I'm *so* looking forward to this) so I bit the bullet and watched the movie.

I'll skip the background since there've been complaints about my posts being too long...

The visuals are amazing and undoubtedly French. The movie reeked of glamorous decadence from minute one and the rich revolving colors are a feast for the eyes (though for my motion-sickness challenged self it was a bit disorienting). The voluptuous ladies and gorgeous costumes made a definitive point about the stark contrast between the culture (high society) and the political/actual situation at the time, one of the most turbulent moments in French history.

But the plot... GEEZ... I'm a big fan of everything coming together nicely, but not when everything falls into place a little *too* easily. And...

*spoiler alert*

... I don't see the point of getting a bunch of people killed to lure the culprit to you when you KNOW who the murderer is!

I understand that the movie needs to go on... and if it wasn't quite set up the way it was, then we wouldn't have even had a movie. But I think what turned me off the most is the fact that there's supernatural powers involved. I'm not against using superpowers. In fact, I'm a huge fan. But it takes all the fun out of the mystery part if you find out at the end that there was no scientifically coherent way to explain the event and so they went the easy way out and explained it all by this masterful plot that involves the ancient Chinese superstition of using young virgins to feed your own vitality (and no, this isn't a joke, the dude was actually successful) - WHA?!

*/spoiler alert*

There's a saying in Chinese, 掛羊頭賣狗肉. False advertising (literally hanging a lamb's head while selling dog meat - barf). I loved Sherlock Holmes because for all his mysterious ways, there's always a very logical answer to seemingly impossible questions. Even for things like Iron Man and Hulk, they use somewhat plausible explanations for their respective sources of power. This was all lacking in the movie. Loose ends were NOT tied up and honestly, there was not much suspense in the whole thing and this was a mystery movie! Puh. Never trust hype.