WITH A FRIEND LIKE HARRY review

God I love the world of film. All the different worlds, personalities, perceptions of reality.

For example… In one week I saw the insanely romantic love drenched world of Baz Luhrmann’s MOULIN ROUGE, then… without batting an eye I haul myself into a local theater to see WITH A FRIEND LIKE HARRY (HARRY, UN AMI QUI VOUS VEUT DU BIEN)… a film on the other end of the visual cinematic universe.

There are two types of films that I usually try to avoid knowing much of anything about… The first is COMEDY, so many comedies are meant for a one time laugh, and digging too hard ruins the laugh. The other is the mystery suspense film. Often times you may guess over the course of the film where it may be headed, but… That’s part of the fun of these films, and if perchance the film maintains the mystery… Keeps you off balance till the bitter end, well then you’ve found a doozy.

WITH A FRIEND LIKE HARRY is that doozy.

The film begins with a family of five… Michel, a white collar French/Japanese language instructor… Tired, brow beaten by life… Exhausted from moment to moment. There’s his wife, Claire… An incredibly energy sapped wife that tries to handle the couple’s 3 lovely little daughters: Jeanne, Sarah and Iris. All of whom are under the age of 5. Like I said, the feature gets underway with the family of five heading off on their vacation in an un-air conditioned car on a hot and sweaty day… Some of the windows don’t roll down… It’s been a long day on the road.. the oldest daughter is bored and hot and wanting refreshments… she’s kicking the back of Michel’s chair as he drives… Sarah begins whining and screaming as Iris begins teasing her and… Well folks, the way the sound is handled, you can feel the agony of 3 little girls screaming on a hot long day in a car with no amenities and the screams coming from behind you… the sound of your chair being kicked… the sweaty aggravation upon Michel’s face… The nasty sweaty look of crying simpering babies… Mouth agape screaming nonsense… The chair being kicked, the pleads for them to calm down, the on going screaming, the kicking, the flared tempers… Michel’s eyes staring into the rear view mirror, crying agonizing brats… The wife with a hand on her head… telling Michel it is too hot… the kids screaming, Michel’s CHAIR KICKED AGAIN AND AGAIN… the traffic picks up, Michel begins SCREAMING AT THE KIDS TO STOP… They all begin howling in a cacophony of whining shrill sweaty hell screams… and you feel his pain. He looks at his wife… defeated… the screaming faces of his little girls… LIFE HAS DRAINED MICHEL… He is at wit’s end… He wants out, you can tell… there doesn’t seem to be any love on his face at all… He hates his situation… LIFE SUCKS.

There’s a rest stop on the highway, they pull in… They discover that Sarah has a severe diaper rash and is going to be screaming non-stop for the rest of the trip… They blow off seeing Michel’s parents… Michel, visibly distressed leaves to go use the men’s room. We see him washing his hands… splashing cold water on his face… Staring at himself in the mirror… trying to steel himself for the rest of the drive… Suddenly our perspective shifts… We are now watching a man watching Michel… He’s got a goofy look of delightment on his face. He’s just washed his hands and is holding them up like a surgeon awaiting his gloves… And he is absolutely fixed on Michel…

Michel notices him… is a bit creeped out… "Can I help you?"

The man states his name… then asks him to remember him… Michel can not. The man starts holding his front teeth and making a bam noise… NOTHING.. Michel does not know this man… "Harold… Harold Balest… Though you probably remember me best as Harry!" Nothing.

Michel goes through the basic polite conversational jargon… What’s ya doing now? You married? Yadda yadda yadda… They depart, and Michel is a bit pleased that this stranger remembers him with fondness from High School… Simpler days to be sure…

That’s where I’ll leave you. You have the first 10 minutes… the set up for a thriller, black comedy set firmly in REALITY. If you’ve seen THE VANISHING or INSOMNIA you have an idea of the type of film this is.

WITH A FRIEND LIKE HARRY is one of my absolute favorite films of 2001 thus far. A movie that I came out of thrilled to the bone to have sat through…

There comes a time in this movie where one character proposes something to another character and dear god… DEAR GOD… I wanted to scream, this is MADNESS… Insane utter madness… I just couldn’t believe what was just said and the reaction and the ends… DEAR GOD… You have got to see this movie.

The film is wrong in all the right ways. It’s twisted to the breaking point, but not beyond. This film never unravels… This is perfect filmmaking, acting and story-telling. The music, the stark INSOMNIA… HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER style cinematography and unflinching eye…

Then by the time you walk out… the utter delight at what it all means… How it comes together. I loved this film.

Now before you say, "Harry you love every film," I want to give you a bit of a hint about something in my life… I see, on average 2 new movies a day. I try to write about as many as I can, but frankly the editing of the site makes it quite tough. Mediocre films I feel don’t deserve INK or PIXELS as this case may be… I prefer to talk about the films that either enrage me or make me the happiest guy around… But I’m telling you this… If you liked MEMENTO, INSOMNIA or THE VANISHING… If you have a wicked place inside of you… See this movie as quickly as you can.