I first stumbled across Atomik Circus several months back when it played at a US film market and found the whole concept so incredibly odd that I immediately parked it at the upper end of priority films for one of our boys in Montreal to check out when I spotted it on the Fantasia schedule. I mean, you've got a French film starring Mrs. Johnny Depp - that'd be Vanessa Paradis - and one of Guy Ritchie's boys in Jason Flemyng revolving around a wannabe rock singer and an alien invasion. How can you not at least be curious? Trailers look fun, too. This one fell to Michael Lasry who found a lot to like but was left wanting more ...
What is it about French girls with a gap in their two front teeth? Well, actually, I can only think of two. Beatrice Dalle as cracked sexpot Betty in “Betty Blue" whose director's cut I highly recommend and Vanessa Paradis as Concia in “Atomik Circus". Who needs orthodontists when you're that charming?
The film sets off with the enticing narration of a radio host. We know it's going to be a love story and that it'll be fantastic. What we don't expect is behemoths from another dimension which look like over-evolved flies landing in the hillbilly dump of Skotlett during its annual Beef Pie festival only to cause carnage with the intention of… you guessed it! Mating and opening those gates to hell! There are many typical elements in this film (the guy that looks crazy but who's in fact been waiting for the aliens to come; the undying love; the evil aliens and the off-kilter secondary characters) but we're treated to a Punch-and-Judy version of those clichés. The film was so straightforward about how it embraced the stereotypes that the audience applauded its candor when we found out why the aliens were invading Skotlett.
“Atomik Circus" definitely has two good leads. Vanessa Paradis is not, as might have been predicted, annoying. She fits the role quite well and the singing's really not bad either. The music, courtesy of the Little Rabbits, was nominated for best soundtrack in the French equivalent of the Grammys. The other lead falls to Benoit Poelvoorde as Alan Chiasse, an impresario who only wants to get in Concia's pants. His name is translated Chitz in English but in French 'chiasse' usually means a person that is a shit. Names that mean shit aren't usually funny but Poelvoorde intones his in a way that is as if he was expounding on what a big piece of shit he is.
Did I mention that the fly-aliens were called the Shub-Niggurath? This is the Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young in H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu mythos, as I just discovered. Why am I lingering with small details? Ah, because it's more important than the ostensible leading man. I didn't mention the man whose name stands in the title (yet, Poelvoorde gets top-billing) and the reason for which the film suffers. James Bataille (Jason Flemyng) is hardly in the film and when he is, it's nothing we care for. For some unknown reason, he loves Concia when their only time together only served to show us that she's an airhead that repeats herself when the rest of the film proves otherwise. Still, he loves her. However, that doesn't fit with Bosco's plans.
Bosco is Concia's father and owner of Skotlett's Sam Paradiso bar and basically the man who runs the city. After an accident during one of James's aerial tricks (he's a stuntman) which destroys Bosco's bar, James is convicted to 133 years of jail thanks to Bosco's influence. He escapes to find Concia but the aliens are on the prowl and it's up to James to save his true love and at that point, we've barely seen James, he's hardly said a word and we don't give a damn. I didn't say we had to care for him but he's just not interesting and definitely not as exciting as Chiasse.
Nevertheless, the film has much to offer. It's creative and makes excellent use of the minor characters. The Beef Pie festival features a talent show everyone hopes to participate in. The only decent act is of course Concia who breaks into a song here and there and is an aspiring rock star. One village member decides that his act will be Broadway Brody. This is how it goes: he takes his dog (animatronics is employed to enliven the dog; hilarity ensues), places in front of a mike and presses on Brody's open flesh wound with appropriate pressure to get a desired pitch. Brody bites? Doesn't matter; he got his teeth removed! Yep, it's that kind of movie.
The kills are gruesome and most times uproarious. What's great is that the effects are more than decent and the film doesn't overdo it on the hemoglobin side. Also, the Poiraud brothers don't go gung-ho on the CGI as many French films have been doing recently (Vidocq, Blueberry, The Daltons to mention a few. It's like kids who just discovered a new toy and use it over-exaggeratedly until it loses all its novelty and we lose our interest). “Atomik Circus" doesn't show everything but it shows just enough. It's a kooky film that should've been just a bit longer. As it ended, it felt unfinished and half-assed. The conclusion is one of its low points and as we wait for the film to hit its highest note, it strikes us with an anticlimax.
I've since discovered that “Atomik Circus" is an adaptation of an unfinished comic book by one of the Poiraud brothers. That's exactly what the film feels like, an unfinished film. There is a lot of talent in there, though, and we hope to see much more from the Poiraud brothers. Let's hope they do get to make another film since its box-office results were disastrous. It should be watched because it is undoubtedly a step into what should be a wonderful evolution into much better films by the brothers.
One thing that should be mentioned is how the subtitles simply don't live up to the script's lyricism which I though was great. How is it that one translates “Ça t'arracherait la gueule" meaning “Would it rip off your face" into “Would it kill you"? It loses much of its liveliness. Many of the subs simply don't do justice to the original text.
Review by Michael Lasry.