CONTINENTAL: UN FILM SANS FUSIL

Director: Stéfane Lafleur
Cast: Marie-Ginette Guay, Gilbert Sicotte, Réal Bossé, Fanny Mallette, Pauline Martin Run Time: 103 minutes
Country: Canada
Language: French with English subtitles
Rating:  Not yet rated

CONTINENTAL, UN FILM SANS FUSIL is a stunning debut by director Stéphane Lafleur. Distinguished by both its stone-faced hu-mour and its poignancy, the film is simultaneously elegant and absurd, a truly exquisite portrait of loneliness and uneasy redemption. The film wowed audiences at the Venice film festival before going on to win the Citytv Award for Best First Canadian Feature Film at the 2007 Toronto International Film Festival®. The disappearance of a businessman triggers unexpected, elliptical relationships among four solitary characters desperately searching for companionship. A pretty receptionist at a sparsely populated hotel leaves a phone message: ―The test results were negative; it‘s probably for the best.

We later realize she left the message for herself.  She begins to pursue a guest – an insurance salesman – who has recently been hired to replace the missing businessman. As they stumble toward a connection, we return to the painfully comic ambivalence of the businessman‘s abandoned wife, who defiantly throws out his belongings – only to chase down the garbage truck to get them back. The absent husband makes his presence felt through wordless but loaded phone calls that hit her like silent grenades.  With incisive humour and compassion, Lafleur explores the ways our desires make us vulnerable – to a stranger claiming they saw our missing spouse, to those who won‘t ask us to dance, to those who say ―no. As the film‘s exquisite characters search for connec-tion, they have to take what they can get. Somehow, it is enough.

Lafleur is in complete control of the intricate story and its singular tone. Its comedic moments wonderfully illuminate and leaven the film‘s striking depth and somber wisdom. Sara Mishara‘s exceptional cinematography provides proportion, grace and insight that dig-nify every frame. The cast beautifully externalizes the humanity Lafleur finds in us all, showing it to be funny, flawed and brave.

“Pitch-perfect … Sara Mishara‘s lensing [is] especially deft in capturing the mystery at the heart of banality.” - Ronnie Scheib, Variety