Customer Reviews

I Dreamt Under Water

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In the 2008 French film "J'ai rêvé sous l'eau" (I Dreamt Under The Water), we follow university dropout Antonin, a bit of a slacker who spends late nights with his musician friends, including the focus of his unrequitted love, Alex. When Alex dies of an overdose, the devastated Antonin wanders aimlessly into habitual drug use and gay sex, eventually starting to turn tricks to put a roof over his head. When a repeat client offers him a job at his video store, Antonin at first declines, but later accepts it when he takes a "time out" and seeks out a reunion with his old friends, through which he meets Juliette, seemingly a kindred spirit but with a dark secret of her own.

This is an extremely dark, plodding film on many levels, including a directorial style that will turn off many viewers. The film has minimal dialogue, and most of the story is revealed by carefully watching the scenes, which the director often chooses to present in very dim lighting or distracting strobes, or with "artsy" double exposures and blurred images. Except for Hubert Benhamdine's role as Antonin, I also found the acting contrived and overdone, for the most part. Mostly French with English subtitles, although the songs are in English. Would be rated NC-17 for graphic (gay and straight) sex. DVD extras only include trailers. In my opinion, this is a disappointing 2 stars out of 5.

ok, don't like the premise of someone who is gay changing in 2 minutes
to 'straight' , illogical at best.
well crafted except for that
acting was faily well.

While at times strange and otherworldly.....and somewhat heinous, I really enjoyed this movie. It was certainly worth the price and I am very pleased.


Thank You.

Christopher Haddon

It should not take a psychiatrist to like this film, but other reviewers don't see its depth (yes, an oxymoron: a "film" cannot be deep since it is so thin), so here goes. I outline the plot below as a guide. There are no real surprises to spoil - the film unfolds more like music than like a plot-driven, suspense movie. The sound-track lyric quoted above about says it all.

Antonin is the only child of an absent father, and an infantile, seductive, and inadequate mother. This means (in the truncated language of a movie) he has learned how to feel from her, with no 'father' as a model. He falls in love with an extremely handsome bandmate junkie - we are "treated" to extreme close-ups of his face - who dies in Antonin's arms. Antonin promptly descends into homosexual promiscuity, offering himself in love, but no one recognizes and "adopts" him -- until someone very appropriate actually might. At about the same time, Antonin meets Juliette, a woman whom he can love and who loves him, which leads Antonin to reject the man's love in favor of a heterosexual outcome. Then the woman turns out to be another junkie. Antonin returns to his male lover but "cheats" on him, seeking to rescue Juliette from the abyss and make her his own. He speaks to her just as he spoke to his flakey mother: "You deserve better". His male lover finds Antonin just as he is dragging Juliette out of the "shooting gallery", and Antonin must make a choice.

The outcome is in doubt.