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7 out of 8 people found the following review useful: The funniest film you'll see all year - a rare treat for old cinephiles., 3 August 2001 Author: alice liddell (hitch1899_@hotmail.com) from dublin, ireland
This short is a cineaste's delight, a parody so lovingly detailed it becomes a celebration. 'Je t'aime John Wayne' is a reworking of Godard's classic 'A bout de souffle'. In that film, Jean-paul Belmondo played a petty hood who modelled himself on Humphrey Bogart. In this, Kris Marshall is Belmondo, aka Tristan, a middle class English boy in love with all things French - he speaks ponderous French all the time, dresses sharply, philosophises, epigramises (sic?), poses.The director of this film, Toby MacDonald, however, succeeds where Godard 'failed'. In 'Souffle', we were intended to notice the disparity between Belmondo's Frenchness, posturing and insignificance, and Bogart's mythic cool. Unfortunately, Belmondo is so charismatic and cool and funny, filmed in energetic, sunny monochrome against a delicious jazz backing, that he himself, unwittingly, became a figure of mythic cool. Tristan is not the first person to be dazzled by Belmondo's persona - sure, I've done it myself, snarling 'Te es vraiment deguelasse' at my mirror. France, to foreign eyes, especially in the 50s and 60s, is so romantically cool. So Godard fails.England, however, is not very cool, especially when it tries to ape European sophistication. So although MacDonald expertly mimics Godard's enthusiastic jump-cut style and breezy music, Tristan is less successful. Every attempt at cool is hampered by bathos. The name 'Tristan', for a start, is public-school naff, and his brilliant answering machine message (with the Duke threatening any caller) is spoiled somewhat by his mother's middle class concern. A rendezvous we assume to be a romantic account with an unobtainable blonde turns out to be his loud little sister, who brings a little friend (he punishes them by bringing them to an excruciatingly pretentious art movie). A long exercise in posed cool turns out to be an uncool wait for a very uncool bus. Et cetera.This is all very amusing, but could seem like rather a petty object of satire - middle-class pseuds trying to be French. The film transcends this pettiness in two ways. Firstly, although Tristan is ridiculous, he is never a contemptible figure of ridicule. this is where the Englishness comes in - the disparity between Tristan's dreams and reality becomes poignant. Ultimately, the film affirms these dreams, the power they give Tristan to transcend his banal reality, even if he is so lost in them, he has no more purchase on any kind of reality. This is helped by the pastiche stylings being rooted in a very real, documentary London.Even more than this, the film's fun conceals a melancholy elegy for European cinema and its decline. Godard may have made a film about a slavish imitator, but his film, despite its borrowings, was something radically new, which contained the possibility for revolutionising the cinema. Twenty years later, however, it was as if it hadn't been made, cinema settling into the rut of offensive banality it's been happy to be stuck in since. Unlike Godard, MacDonald is as much of an imitator as his hero - we no longer believe in the possibility of anything new in cinema: it's sad, but significant, that one of the most inventive films around at the moment should be a pastiche of past glories.
2 out of 2 people found the following review useful: A little cracker of a spoof, 22 August 2001 Author: Mathias Disney from London, England
I saw this as a short accompanying another film, and it turned out to be a real treat. Maybe part of the charm was the surprise element (I hadn't realised there was a short), but this shows real promise. It's a stylish, 5 minute homage. A romp through the cliches of French cinema, as seen through the eyes of a cocksure London chancer. He's so convinced he's Jean-Paul Belmondo in Godard's 1960 classic, A bout de Souffle, that even his mum can't get any sense out of him any more. Suffice to say he charms, he poses, and he eventually gets the girl - a dead ringer for Jean Seberg. Nicely written and played, with some real laughs. But it won't make much sense unless you've seen Godard's film.
3 out of 4 people found the following review useful: French, but not as you know it, 17 July 2001 Author: Popey-6 from London, England
An utterly wonderful short film showing a day in the life of a Jean Paul Belmondo wannabe, living his life as if the French New Wave had never crashed on the shore of film history. For our hero lives in London, and as such, the whole piece is exquisitely filmed in black and white as a tongue in cheek take on French cinema of the 1950s/1960s, even managing to make many of the scenes and even sets appear to correspond to Breathless.But that's not all, the quick editing and sublime attention to detail makes this a must see for fans of short spoof films and new wavers alike. Clever, inventive and, so so British, if it wasn't so French.
1 out of 1 people found the following review useful: Like being a teenager again., 17 July 2001 Author: caparzo21
Usually when I see that there is a short film in front of a main feature, this is a coded message for 'have a five minute nap'.What a pleasant surprise. I saw this in front of 'Together' (brilliant) at the G.F.T, and it gave me a real craving for Godard's movies and for that arrogant, self-conscious charm Belmondo portrays so effortlessly.Kris Marshall was tremendous and did a lot with his small part; one prime example is how pleased he is with himself as he shaves and smokes a lucky strike at the same time. Very Belmondo.The G.F.T is showing 'Bande a' Part' this month and I recommend that if you liked 'Je t'aime...', you catch that to see where, in part, the inspiration for 'Je t'aime John Wayne' came from.
Mildly interesting unless you are a die-hard Belmondophile--then it's brilliant, 23 February 2008 Author: planktonrules from Bradenton, Florida
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
Having seen Godard's film BREATHLESS (A BOUT DE Soufflé), JE T'AIME JOHN WAYNE makes a lot of sense. The main character in BREATHLESS is a cool thief and punk played by Jean Paul Belmondo and you should be familiar with this in order to appreciate JE T'AIME JOHN WAYNE as it's a homage to this character. The lead is a Brit who is obsessed with the film and tries to dress, talk, act and even smoke like Belmondo. He thinks he's so cool, though many around him laugh at his antics. However, into his world comes the girl of his dreams--a lady who looks and dresses like Belmondo's lady love in BREATHLESS, Jean Seberg. Together, it's destiny and their lives seem perfect together.As I said, if you aren't familiar with BREATHLESS, then all this will be lost and the film of only minor interest. If, like me you are very familiar with BREATHLESS but didn't love the film (I know this sounds like heresy to many Cinephiles), then it's more interesting. But if you adored the original film, then you'll no doubt adore this film.By the way, this film is part of the CINEMA 16: European Shorts DVD. On this DVD are 16 shorts. Most aren't great, though because it contains THE MAN WITHOUT A HEAD, COPY SHOP, RABBIT and WASP, it's an amazing DVD for lovers of short films and well worth buying.
Matinée in from the cold, 7 May 2006 Author: deepindercheema-1 from United Kingdom
I am certain that Kriss must have been involved in the writing, is the bloke with the beard sleeping in the cinema credited? write in and tell us cowboy.I have no issues with the film, and see no need to be critical. I thoroughly enjoyed it.I am surprised that Kriss who is so young has been able to become exposed to so much idiomatic french film-making, there is hardly any shown nowadays on TV. I used to see a lot of Japanese and french film, as well as German TV series (remember derrick?) in the late 70's early 80's. It just does not seem to happen at all, with so much cheap TV time to fill. I even used to see polish and iranian film on the do#mestic channels.
1 out of 2 people found the following review useful: .....and now it's an advert..., 29 November 2003 Author: mad_man_moon from London, England
I can't write any of the elegant words the guy before me did, however it seem like far too long since I saw this.It cracked me up when I saw it, and not in the laugh at it because I got the references/jokes etc (a la arty types watching foreign/indy films).It's such a shame that it's now an advert, this should be showcased somewhere!
2 out of 6 people found the following review useful: Funny short that makes fun of it's own pretension, 16 March 2002 Author: bob the moo from Birmingham, UK
Belmonde lives in 1990's London as a iconic, cool French man modelled on the new wave cinema of the 1960s. Unfortunately he is actually English and middle class – a fact that his family won't let him forget no matter how hard he tries.At the start of this short I thought it was yet another pretentious French short harking back to the 60's in style and character. However after a few minutes we find that the ill tempered complex Frenchman Belmonde is really an English boy, pretending to be French. At this point the short becomes more enjoyable, rather than being pretentious it is actually making fun of those films and the people who try to be like them. This actually makes it very funny and I felt free to laugh at this art – without destroying it in my mind.The `story' doesn't really go anywhere but rather allows a series of scenes where Belmonde is made fun of as he tries to be like his heroes.It's clever and funny and manages to hold the interest easily for the brief running time. With no story to speak of, it's never going to brilliant, but where many shorts fall into the trap of being artsy and pretentious this side steps this trap by poking fun at it's main character without actually making fun of the art itself (in this case French new wave).
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