Le Belle Écrane is a monthly column on Quebec film culture from a local point of view.

There is not much blood in Pascal Plante’s blood Red roomsbut that doesn’t stop it from slipping under your skin. The film features one of the most disturbing moments I have seen in a film. Two young women sit in front of a computer screen in a cold, minimalist condo. We hear screams and the sound of power tools. We hear splashing. Their faces glow with red light and tears fall down one of them. My hair stands on end just thinking about it today.

Red rooms is Pascal Plante’s third feature film and the Quebec filmmaker’s first thriller. It reimagines the serial killer film from an unusual angle by following two young women sitting in the courtroom. They are “serial killer groupies,” who obsessively follow the details of the case. Last summer, the film premiered in the Czech Republic at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, where it won the Best Film award. Shortly after, he inaugurated the Fantasia Film Festival in Montreal.

“It was triumphant,” says Mathieu Li-Goyette, editor-in-chief of Panorama-Cinéma, an online film magazine based in Montreal, about the film’s Quebec premiere. “It was rise high“, he explains in French. “The welcome was exceptional. Everyone in the room loved it and it was a good start for the film’s trajectory in Quebec. »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HePEZINhgwtxZosB

What a set Red rooms aside, it wasn’t just a true crime film, it was about true crime. The film reflects on a growing phenomenon of amateur sleuths and murder obsessions gravitating toward podcasts, television series, and Internet communities. Who among us hasn’t indulged in the ever-increasing content mill of true crime? Pascal Plante’s film shows the dark side of this phenomenon, its impact on the victims’ families and the real extent of the violence (a real feat since most of the bloodshed remains off-screen).

With many scenes shot behind a computer screen in isolated apartments, the film seems to turn the camera back on us. Kelly-Anne’s glassy gaze as she conducts her research and investigations online reveals a view of our digital lives that amplifies alienation. Kelly-Anne’s quest to find the last tape created by a serial killer to put him in prison is presented as not a noble journey for justice, but a singular and obsessive quest.

“The heart of the film, at its core, is about true crime fandom,” says Li-Goyette. “I think that’s why it’s so relatable. Most crime stories follow the police or an investigator, but here it’s just someone in the audience who is just crazy and disciplined enough to have an influence on an investigation. For once, it’s a film that represents the public and the public likes this kind of story.

Red rooms didn’t sweep the Iris, Quebec’s version of the Oscars, but “it still really touched the public,” says Li-Goyette. He cites other films like Humanist vampire looking for a willing suicidal person and the next one, Vile and miserablean adaptation of a popular graphic novel, part of a similar wave of genre films reaching a wider audience. “These are well-made genre films that help the public reconnect a little with popular cinema.”

Red rooms enjoyed surprise success outside of Quebec with modest box office results in France last year and this fall in the United Kingdom and the United States. The success of the film seems modeled on that of the province; it’s not a huge financial success, but it’s one of the most talked about films of the fall among critics and discerning horror fans.

For Li-Goyette, part of the film’s success is that it appeals to a broader trend in cinephilia. “It’s a bit of a crime thriller with a touch of David Fincher, a bit of the same as a lot of other films, but with the added twist of focusing on the women,” he says. “I have the feeling that our commercial cinema (in Quebec) is moving more in this direction. A cold, almost mathematical efficiency. I almost see it as part of an inferiority complex, that to compete with Hollywood and English-speaking productions, we have to show the world that we are “professionals”.

But the film is undeniably Quebecois. The film takes place on the streets of Montreal; it houses the Palace of Justice. The language has typically Quebecois tones and intonation. Mathieu Li-Goyette also points out that the film also uses tropes from Quebec culture, such as the television show that features prominently in the film, a riff on the very popular panel show, Everyone is talking about it.

Although the film received almost universal acclaim, Li-Goyette remains a rare dissenter. He likes the film but has reservations. “I really appreciate the evolution of Pascal Plante’s work and I think it’s good that the film has drawn attention to his cinematography and also to Quebec cinema, but I also question his moral vision “, he said. “The main character is presented as a techno-hacker superhero and it’s easy to get carried away by that without asking too many questions. He’s presented in a somewhat uncritical way.” Without getting too much into spoilers, his objections lie in the final act, over how Kelly-Anne secures the tape.

Li-Goyette admits that he is a little harder on the film because he comes from Quebec. “If the film came from Finland,” he says with a laugh, “I probably wouldn’t be so critical.” It reveals a common point of discussion among Quebec critics: with our cinema so dependent on public funding, how to be critical without feeding bad actors who want to defund the arts. The critical community feels a responsibility towards its cinema, not only to celebrate it, but also to hold it accountable. “We feel very close to the films, very involved,” he says.

Produced in collaboration with Le Réseau des Créateurs Québécois