FAMILIAR GROUND (Stéphane Lafleur). 89 minutes. Subtitled. Opens Friday (July 29). See listing Rating: NN
Some people really like Stéphane Lafleur’s stylized 2007 feature Continental, A Film Without Guns. I’m not one of them, so perhaps it’s no surprise that I didn’t much enjoy his new feature, Familiar Ground, either.
In tone and affect, Familiar Ground is exactly the same movie as Continental, in that it’s an arch, aloof study of people living unhappy lives in rural Quebec. But where the earlier film took the form of a very lazy mystery, following four characters in the wake of the disappearance of a fifth, the new picture has far less to animate it.
This time the focus is on a pair of adult siblings who’ve found themselves in separate wintry ruts. Benoît (Francis La Haye) is socially awkward and can’t win over his girlfriend’s hostile son. Maryse (Fanny Mallette) is questioning her marriage and quietly obsessing over what it would be like to lose an arm. (Quirky, right?)
Eventually, their mutual tensions – and a cryptic visit from a man claiming to have arrived from the near future – lead them on a trip to their father’s frigid cottage that could spell salvation or disaster.
Lafleur stages each scene as if he’s building to some droll punchline, but only a couple of his ideas actually pay off. For the most part, Familiar Ground is true to its title: a bleak slog through the very familiar territory of Continental, with a slight variance in tone. It does look great, though.
