Café de Flore

I think everybody will agree that Cafe de Flore is very confident filmmaking. With all the other opinions, I will differ :) … Jean-Marc Vallée has made an ambitious drama about love, non-love, coming to terms with fate… karma (?), and he’s made it as a filmmaker unafraid to draw attention to himself, quite the opposite, in fact. Formally, it’s very high level, shiny and proud; for some, the result can feel almost like annoying artsy onanism. For what I’ve read so far, some of the reviewers are not going easy on it, but I believe competent creators can allow themselves to “show-off” like this. And what’s more, under all that elegant surface there isn’t just some third-rate banality, there is a beautiful idea (though, here there are some conflicting opinions, too, for some viewers “that” can easily be bullshit). Café de Flore struck me emotionally, right into the heart. One of the best new films I watched in the first half of 2012, if not the best. PS: The saddest film that ends the (happy?) way it ends. (30/06/2012)

This might be the first time when music from Sigur Rós failed to put me in the right mood in the film. Café de Flore is an interesting film, but the Canadians made it so carelessly that I couldn’t get closer to the individual characters. For example, DJ was supposed to milk the audience’s emotions with his relationship, but he left me completely unmoved. Even though the musical background was great. The movie had its highlights, but I missed a more distinctive punchline that would allow me to say in the end that this is a really cool movie. (29/12/2012)