“The best laid plans of mice and men oft go awry.” “Want to make God laugh? Tell him your plans.” “Don’t count your chickens before they hatch.” And so on and so forth. Conventional culture is filled with phrases relating to the idea that no matter what you plan for things they can still go wrong. Sometimes in ways so ridiculous you simply must laugh at the result. Estevan Morin’s Desole, Pardon, Je M’Excuse (Sorry, Pardon Me, Excuse Me) is an examination of such a concept through the lens of the utterly absurd.
Ella has a rather strange peccadillo. Rather than watching sports, or binging whatever show is big on Netflix, Ella passes time by watching torture videos online. The more gruesome the better. She soon realizes she might get an even bigger thrill by torturing someone herself. She sets out to find the perfect victim, thinking she has found that in Donatien, a depressed man she finds about to leap off a bridge. However, once it comes time to pull the trigger on the torture, Ella finds that while the flesh is willing the spirit is weak and she can’t go through with it, leading to a darkly comedic series of misadventures and mayhem.
On paper this idea is fantastic, and I think in execution it at least partially succeeds. The film succeeds in showing how the reality of murder is far less fantastic and romantic than true crime nerds make it out to be. Indeed, the film is a fantastic criticism of the culture that glamorizes serial killers, painting such people as often inept and blundering fools who succeed only out of luck instead of any sort of calculation. That being said, at times the film comes off as trying too hard to make such a scenario zany and comedic. Eva Prevost’s version of Ella as a bubbly valley girl type with a penchant for violence comes off as tired and cliched and gets old very quickly. “She’s a petite giggly redhead but she likes torture videos! Isn’t that WACKY?!” There may as well have a title card with a bold and underlined ‘GET IT?!” after every joke she does. Luc Olivier-Boutet as the luckless and depressed Donatien is a far more likeable character, exuding at tired and “well I didn’t really want to die before but I’d rather be dead than deal with this bullshit anymore” aura that comes off as entirely authentic. And Julianne Boucher-Telmosse as the exasperated crush of Donatien is the perfect foil to Prevost’s sugary over the top manic serial killer fanatic.
Desole…isn’t a bad movie per se. Rather, it feels like a great idea (and it is indeed a fantastic idea) which gets buried in an excess of trimmings that the filmmakers chose to include out of a fear of the point not getting through. Erring on the side of excess, so to speak. It’s a movie that could be fun but quickly becomes rather exhausting and begins to stumble under the weight of the miscellaneous crazy scenarios that get thrown into the mix to make Ella’s venture into torture all the more hilarious.
