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stevenlemahieu
Reviews
La jouissance des hystériques (2000)
Sex and the Revolution.
This movie is an introduction into psychoanalysis combined with an apprehension of Marxism, but never in a boring way. In the sixties some youngsters claimed for sex, drugs and rock and roll. That is not the point of this movie. It is the story of a director who thinks that every movie he makes must be: 1. an introduction into the revolution and 2. an exercise in how to seduce women. The director, who looks as a mixture of the Dutch film director Theo Van Gogh or the writer Jan Wolkers and the French television-star Colluche, does not realize that when you make women think independently for the sake of the revolution, that they get more personality and that they become more difficult to seduce. Above all he must keep order in the film studio (in a wood), which is apparently not so easy because at the end the film ends in complete chaos. The director, in fact the main character of the movie, understands that his actresses have grown mature by his own teachings and he must admit that they go their own way: he must also accept from now on his solitude. Funny approach of an "Education Sentimentale" in the film environment.
Camping Cosmos (1996)
Extravagant people on a Belgian caravan park.
This movie is a surrealistic description of a colony of holiday-makers on a camping site at the Belgian beach. They all have one thing in common: they just want to do nothing or have sex. They all develop different attitudes because they think that they feel free far from home. So you see them in a relax way. Miss Vandeputte (Lolo Ferrari) is constantly looking after a new lover. The director of the art-festival at the beach is confronted with the blames of his daughter who claims he is loosing his time with the people of the camping site who never show up for one of his attractions be it a play of Bertold Brecht or an interview with the writer Pierre Mertens (Noël Godin). The residents of the caravan park are only interested in looking at a boxing-match or a beauty-contest. I liked this movie because it shows in a funny way the difference between people when they go on holiday.
La vie politique des Belges (2002)
Funny documentary about Belgian attitudes.
This movie reveals the struggle of two opposite parties, Tarte and Vivant for the votes of the most progressive part of the public. It is not a serious documentary about politics but it shows how some intellectuals or businessmen try to find solutions for the problems of poverty and injustice. You can listen to the rather technical explanations of Vivant with Roland Duchâtelet or one can also laugh with the approach of Noël Godin of Tarte who has a more detached posture towards politics. He acts as a clown and receives some sympathy from young people. The question is: must politics always be boring? The answer of the movie is: No !
La vie sexuelle des Belges 1950-1978 (1994)
Is there anything that makes Belgians so special?
Road movie on the road of life in Belgium of the sixties. Cool! Dark comedy about a writer who wants to become world-famous by leaving his village and his family and going to Brussels. I like his conservative father who is regularly drunk and his aunt who proclaims a big future for him. His sexual initiation at a camping with the movies of Laurel and Hardy at the background is a bad start for him! The movie changes of tone in the second part and becomes more bitter. You can still laugh with the many sketches in which the main actor staggers between self-indulgence and self-critical spot. Splendid photography.