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This Is Our Land (Chez nous)
Drama, Art House & International
Marine Le Pen was defeated in the French election that brought Emmanuel Macron to power, but her far right-wing party, with its nationalist, anti-immigrant platform, lives on to feed the fear and resentment that begot Donald Trump's election. THIS IS OUR LAND is a fictionalized story of an attractive working-class single mother in the North of France who naively agrees to run for mayor, representing the Patriotic Bloc. Lucas Belvaux, who previously directed RAPT, a terrific thriller about a French politician's kidnapping, deals with another type of kidnapping here: With the help of a charming André Dussollier as the town's esteemed physician, the Populists' rhetoric seizes control of the minds of the electorate. With Catherine Jacob as the blonde-bobbed leader who never met an angry crowd she couldn't make angrier.
Rating
NR
Director
Lucas Belvaux
Studio
DistriB Films
Writer
Lucas Belvaux, Jérôme Leroy, Jérôme Leroy
  • Tant qu'il parle politique, Chez Nous est absolument passionnant. En nous plongeant dans une petite ville du Nord, le film de Lucas Belvaux tente d'expliquer la montée de l'extrême droite dans notre pays et y arrive plutôt bien. Malheureusement, Belvaux s'encombre d'une histoire d'amour particulièrement loupée et ce n'est ni la faute d'Emilie Dequenne, excellente et Guillaume Gouix, mais bien d'un scénario qui passe à côté de ce qu'il aurait dû être (et qui tombe un peu dans la caricature avec le personnage d'Anne Marivin). André Dussollier, Catherine Jacob et Patrick Descamps sont remarquables.
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  • This Is Our Land may occasionally try to do too much, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't want someone to make an American version of this film and blast it into every multiplex in the country.
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  • The drama is well-paced, and all of the actors are wonderful.
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  • Belvaux has made a gutsy, discomfiting movie about going along to get along, and just how dangerous that impulse can ultimately be.
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  • This Is Our Land is essential viewing for its damning critiques, even if it is too thematically overblown.
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  • While too baldly calculated and on-message to rank with Belvaux's best, "Our Land" will see perhaps the strongest returns of his career given the topicality.
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