Brotherhood of the Wolf (Le Pacte des loups, 2001)

Dir: Christophe Gans

Country: France

Runtime: 142 min
Language: French (English subtitles)
Cast: Samuel Le Bihan (Grégoire de Fronsac), Mark Dacascos (Mani), Vincent Cassel (Jean-François de Morangias), Emilie Dequenne (Marianne de Morangias), Monica Bellucci (Sylvia)

Review © 2002 Branislav L. Slantchev

I am perhaps known for my rubber credulity, which can stretch without breaking like miles of well-chewed bubble gum. Even with that generous allowance, however, The Brotherhood proved about a parsec longer than it could take, and should have been named The Pact of the Lumpen instead. By trying to cater to every taste segment in the audience, this period adventure horror martial arts conspiracy drama becomes a laughable (unintentional) parody of the genres it attempts to straddle. Such a pity too because the story had so much to offer, and because most of the problems come from botched execution more than anything else.

The story is curious enough (and as far as I can tell, it is based on a popular French legend). The year is 1765, and some unknown animal terrorizes the populace of Gevaudan, a small province in France. The vicious creature attacks with no warning, mutilating and disemboweling women and children, though curiously avoiding men. The hunt for the elusive animal proves unsuccessful time after time, so much so that many begin to believe that it is a supernatural being, tentatively titled "The Beast," that has come to punish the godless rule of the King. The rumors, buttressed in no small measure by an anonymous revolutionary pamphlet conveniently explaining the Beast's purpose, eventually reach Paris and the distressed king sends his experienced gardener Fronsac (Samuel Le Bihan) to find the darned thing. Fronsac quickly befriends some of the provincial aristocrats, gets on the bad side of others, and finds himself falling head over heels for the virtuous Marianne (Emilie Dequenne) while frequenting the local brothel for the services of the voluptuous and gorgeous as ever Sylvia (Monica Belluci). In his adventures, the intrepid Fronsac, who seems to do nothing but prance around like an idiot, is accompanied by a trusty Iroquois Indian Mani (Mark Dacascos) with inexplicable knowledge of Asian martial arts. It must be a New World thing... as time after time we are told whenever Mani miraculously cures a victim of the Beast with some powder displaying the amazing advances of primitive medical science, or when he "communicates" with the Beast after ingesting some mushrooms (THAT one I believe).

Well, eventually it turns out there's no supernatural stuff, just some crazy brother with incestuous designs and half-decomposed hand that seemed muscular enough to me. In the most idiotic twist of the plot, Sylvia (the aforementioned prostitute) turns out to be a spy of the Pope -- what a cover, eh? -- and poisons Fronsac so that his enemies will be deceived into burying him. His stupid enemies are deceived, and when he comes back to kick ass, they are all dumbfounded. As was I. Why did she need him at all? She could have easily arrested everyone, just like she did. (On whose authority, by the way, did she do that? Not the King's, who had fabricated the slaying of the Beast some months earlier, and in whose eyes the Beast officially did not exist.) Why did Fronsac have to kick ass at all? What were all these people with muskets there for anyway? Why could not the director spare us the apocalyptic battle between Fronsac and Morangias (Vincent Cassel)? What African animal was the stupid Beast after all? And what did we do to deserve the pathetic imitation of Titanic in the closing scene? Oh, I can fly...

Forgetting for a second the severe problems with script logic, continuity, and simple entertainment value, let's turn to the execution. As I said, this was the worst. First, and contrary to what you may have heard, the fight scenes are laughably bad. They are pathetic and incompetent. The choppy close-ups, the changing film speeds, and the murky detail, are all things of the past. This is not how these things are done anymore. We need to see detail, we need to see action spanning the entire screen, we need to see acrobatics. Not crappy camera work trying to hide the simple fact that these people can't really fake fighting. I also have a gripe about the animation. The animal SFX were atrocious and amateurish. This sort of thing one can expect from a no-budget indie film, but not from a star-studded dud. What was that with the punk gypsies? I felt like watching a remake of Mad Max.

They should have shown more, much more, of Monica Belluci, damnit. All in all, a horrifyingly disappointing feature that was not scary, was badly done, and was way too long for what it accomplishes.

February 19, 2002