Love songs for Tough Guys

Love songs for Tough Guys
Original title:Cette musique ne joue pour personne
Director:Samuel Benchetrit
Release:Cinema
Running time:107 minutes
Release date:Not communicated
Rating:
In a port city, isolated people, used to violence, will suddenly see their lives turned upside down by theater, poetry and art. And their daily lives are transformed by love.

Mulder's Review

Cinema is a field that is conducive to all kinds of research and experimentation, and this is something that director and screenwriter Samuel Benchetrit has perfectly understood.  For his seventh film after several comedies, Janis and John (2003), Chez Gino (2011) and dramas such as J'ai toujours rêvé d'être un gangster (2008), Un voyage (2014), Asphalte (2015) and Chien (2018). Love songs for Tough Guys allows him to approach the world of gangsters but also the joys of artistic creation whether it is the theater or poetry. The director Samuel Benchetrit continues to appear as the free electron of French cinema by continuing to make films that resemble him and avoiding to follow pre-established models in which studios continue to want to offer comedies that resemble each other and reserve few surprises.

It is interesting to see that the director and screenwriter Samuel Benchetrit never ceases to want to place the action of his films in unusual places, as was the case with Asphalt, and to place there picturesque characters closer to literary people than to real people of the real world. It is the contrast between this shifted reality and our world that makes each of Samuel Benchetrit's films as seductive as they are disturbing. In Love songs for Tough Guys, Samuel Benchetrit pushes his experimentation even further by revisiting a world of mobster films and injecting characters capable of the worst acts into meditation or poetry. 

The action of Love songs for Tough Guys takes place in a city in a port city in northern France. We discover a mafioso Jeff (François Damiens) in the midst of existential doubt who finds in poetry a way to approach a cashier for whom he has fallen in love. Married and father of a young girl with a bad attitude, Jeff prefers to send one of his henchmen to read his poems to the cashier.  On the other hand, Jeff wants to organize a party for his daughter but the people from his daughter's high school don't want to go, so two of Jeff's other henchmen, Jesus (JoeyStarr) and Poussin (Bouli Lanners) are sent to dissuade some people from going to the party and force others to go. Meanwhile, Jacky (Gustave Kervern), another of Jeff's henchmen, joins a theater group that is putting on a musical about Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre. Jacky has fallen in love with a beautiful young woman, Suzanne (Vanessa Paradis), who suffers from a stammer that she loses once she's on stage.

In this northern town, art seems to be the only possibility to get away from reality and find new grounds of exploration away from a standard life with no future. Love songs for Tough Guys is a film as unusual as it is poetic. Far from these comedies that are all alike, this film proves to be a real success both by its excellent casting with François Damiens, Ramzy Bedia, Vanessa Paradis, Gustave Kervern, JoeyStarr, Bouli Lanners, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Vincent Macaigne, Jules Benchetrit, Bruno Podalydès and Samuel Benchetrit.

Surely Love songs for Tough Guys reveals itself as a universe of depressed characters who are all looking to give new meaning to their lives without suspecting that what they need is right in front of their eyes like Jeff who does not see how much his wife loves him and yet with all the violence he sows in his wake coninues to be for his wife the man of her life. In the same way, the film gains in emotions and makes us laugh many times by staging the rehearsals of the members of a play with a surreal director played to perfection by the excellent Bruno Podalydès. The great strength of director Samuel Benchetrit is to succeed in allowing his actors to give the best of themselves. It is also interesting to see the actress Vanessa Paradis in a counter-role of a young actress and singer who lacks confidence in herself. For this role, Vanessa Paradis breaks her image but remains fascinating on screen as she manages to transcend her roles and confirms that she is an excellent actress. 

Finally, we would have liked the character played by the actor Vincent Macaigne to be more present on the screen as this actor is perfect whether in comedies or dramas. Here he certainly gives this film some of its best scenes filled with various emotions. With his disillusioned air and his ordinary man side, he reminds us that we all have the right to be happy and to believe in a better future. 

Love Songs for Tough Guys is definitely one of Samuel Benchetrit's best films and the one with the best cast. We can only advise you to discover it when it will be released in France on September 29th and we hope also in the United States in the coming months.

Love songs for Tough Guys
Directed by Samuel Benchetrit
Produced by Julien Madon
Written by Gabor Rassov, Samuel Benchetrit
Starring François Damiens, Ramzy Bedia, Vanessa Paradis, Gustave Kervern, JoeyStarr, Bouli Lanners, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Vincent Macaigne, Raphaëlle Doyle, Constance Rousseau, Jules Benchetrit, Bruno Podalydès, Samuel Benchetrit, Christophe Reymond, Angelina Woreth, Thibault Cathalifaud, Jean-Louis Barcelona, Julien Prévost
Cinematography : Pierre Aïm
Edited by Clémence Diard
Production companies : A Single Man, J.M. Films, Gapbusters
Distributed by UGC Distribution (France)
Release date : September 29, 2021 (France)
Running time : 107 minutes

Seen on September 20, 2021 at the Forum des Images as part of the 300 Club

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