BLACK (Pierre Laffargue). 115 minutes. Opens Friday (August 28). Subtitled. For venues, times and trailers, see Movies. Rating: NNN
Black is a snappy caper flick that overcomes its occasional lack of technical polish with a fast-paced story, great use of exotic Dakar locations and a jaw-dropping third-act twist.[rssbreak]
When an armoured car score goes wrong in Paris, Black (MC Jean Gab’1) accepts his cousin’s offer of a diamond heist in Dakar. That goes wrong, too, and Black ends up chained to a cop (Carole Karemera) and hunted through the slums by Russian mercenaries and mystic wrestlers. After that, things get strange.
Gab’1 convinces as a thug out of water, and he handles the action well, but Karemera has more presence and better acting chops. The villains are a B-movie delight: arms dealer Degrand (François Levantal) with his scaly skin condition and serpentine girlfriend, and head mercenary Ouliakov (Anton Yakovlev), who could have stepped right out of a 70s blaxploitation flick, a genre Black loosely resembles, largely due to its jazzy score, but in no way imitates.
Some of the action is clumsy, but director Pierre Laffargue has a fresh sense of realism that brings urgency to a key fight and the diamond job. He also has a sharp eye for dreams and visual jokes.
