I can't believe I did not hear about Denys Arcand's 'The Fall of the American Empire' back in 2018 when it was released, and thanks to the lockdown stay at home in 2020, I got a free subscription to a movie channel that had this movie!
If you haven't seen his other great movies such as 'The Barbarian Invasions' or 'The Decline of the American Empire' or 'Jesus de Montreal', you may want to watch them as well before or after this one... there's no order.
Let's start with the bad first, as this movie is not perfect but still very enjoyable and so different from the usual fares you typically find on Netflix or Amazon Prime or Hulu. If you're looking for great cinematography, you won't find it here. It's pretty straightforwardly filmed, almost like a cheap TV series you can find on the BBC, France Televisions, CBC or NBC - very old school. You won't find beautiful shots like in Hollywood movies, elaborate tracking shots and beautifully lit shallow depth of field sceneries in the dark or at dawn under a beautiful sky... There are also some glaring plot holes that are hard to understand as you find the main protagonist of the film (Pierre Paul) getting hooked up, falling in love and scheming with a gorgeous call girl (Aspasie) very implausible, their chance encounter with a reformed convict very far fetched, and many other poorly executed plot devices meant to drive the story farther along.
But let's put the above all aside as you will no doubt be smitten by the clever and caustic means by which the filmmaker is able to draw you into his expose on the power of money and the many ways our current system favors the moneyed interests.
It starts with an amazing intro scene dialogue with Pierre Paul (played by Alexandre Landry) talking with his soon to be ex-girlfriend... on the merits of being intelligent in our current society... So nicely put...
Then the movie disguises as a hold-up turned bad drama to really lay out what the filmmaker really wanted to expose... the ways with which powerful moneyed interests are able to cleanse their money and evade our globalized tax system.
It's very well put together and clever, with a tinge of morality that will make you feel good in the end.
Not as satisfying as 'the Barbarian Invasions' which was such a well made movie and well acted and so well put together which won the director an oscar... but this is a very good film nevertheless, and so different from what you can see nowadays... no such thing as identity politics and PC placeholders either which is refreshing...
A must watch really even though it's not perfect, not is it beautifully shot...