User Reviews

Pascal Manise is a police inspector whose wife, a schoolteacher, is under the influence of morphine. Pascal, who loves too much his wife, buys the drug for her with Jacquillat, a local godfather who formerly has given money to left-winger terrorist organization. Pascal, on other hand, search Bruno le Roux, a terrorist of that organization who escaped recently from prison and who search the man who has denounced him to police. That man is Jacquillat and Jacquillat wants that Pascal gives information about Bruno le Roux and for that, refuses drug for Pascal's wife until Pascal accept this deal. Pascal's refusal has for consequences serious withdrawal symptoms for his wife, Agnes. This movie use the same characters that the two former parts of the trilogy and also some sequences, but the lightning of the movie is centred essentially on the problem of drug dependence and its consequences on the loving husband's comportment. The movie is very well acted especially by Dominique Blanc (Agnes, Pascal's wife) and by Gilbert Melki (Pascal).

I've just seen the trilogy on successive nights on Tele-Quebec. An Amazing Couple, said to be a comedy, is painfully bad: there isn't a joke worthy of the name throughout the full two hours. On The Run is better; it's a good little thriller about a man whose obsessions lead him to join a Baader-Meinhof-type gang. Finally, After Life is a character study of a dedicated detective who unknowingly marries a drug addict, then goes around desperately trying to score drugs for her.

Here the actors finally come into their own. Dominique Blanc gives one of the best portrayals of somebody in the grip of addiction that I have seen. Her drug behavior is integrated into her personality in a very convincing way, not just sketched in. The overdose scene is powerful. Her marriage and her role as teacher are suffering from her habit, and she'll have to make a choice. Gilbert Melki shows the tenderness in his cop character; you can believe he'd wreck his career for his wife.

In comparison to "An Amazing Couple", this film has a different texture, as it deals with the realities of drug addiction. The director inserts scenes from the previous film, as we get to see why things happened the way they did in the second installment of this trilogy.

It is incredible to think Agnes, very nicely played by Dominique Blanc, has been able to maintain her drug problem for more than 20 years and still keep her job at the local high school where she teaches. Now we know: her husband Pascal, a detective, keeps her supplied with drugs he takes from junkies and dealers. Pascal is Agnes worst enemy because being afraid to lose her, he maintains also a double life; not only does he not help the woman he loves, but breaks the law in the process.

It is even more incredible when we see road blocks where people are checked for possible drug dealing in the school where Agnes teach and where another teacher is interrogated about the drug problem in that particular school. In many ways this film is an eye opening in knowing to what extent drugs are prevalent in today's society, be it in Europe, or the United States.

Some of the material doesn't work very well. There are many unanswered questions in this whole mess. The best thing for the film are Gilbert Melki, as the detective that is willing to break the law and Dominique Blanc, as the tormented Agnes.

"On the Run (Cavale)" is the first third of an engrossing experiment in story telling that crosses "Rashomon" with a television miniseries to show us an ensemble of intersecting characters over a couple of days to gradually reveal the complicated truth about each.

Writer/director Lucas Belvaux uses a clever technique to communicate just how differently the characters perceive the same situations-- they are literally in different movies and, a la "Rules of the Game," everyone has their reasons.

"On the Run"is a tense, fast-paced escaped con on-the-run Raoul Walsh-feeling film, with the auteur himself playing a Humphrey Bogart-type who can be cruel or kind; "An Amazing Couple (Un couple épatant)" is an Ernest Lubitch-inspired laugh-out-loud comedy of mistaken communication; and "After the Life (Après la vie)" is a Sidney Lumet-feeling gritty, conflicted cop melodrama with seamy and tender moments.

"Time Code" experimented turning the two-dimensions of film into three with multiple digital video screens. This trilogy is more effective in showing us what happens as characters leave the frame. Belvaux goes beyond the techniques used in the cancelled TV series "Boomtown" or the films of Alejandro González Iñárritu in "Amores Perros" and "21 Grams" with their stream-of-consciousness flashbacks character by character.

I don't see how I can deal with each film separately. Theoretically, one can see the three movies alone or independently out of order, but that would be like watching one episode of a series like "The Wire" or "The Sopranos" and wondering what the big deal is. Only a handful of patrons in my theater joined me in a one-day triple-feature; I guess the others have a better memory than I do that they could see each film on separate days, though a marathon does inevitably lead to some mind-wandering that could miss important clues and revelations so this is ideal for a triple-packed DVD.

On DVD we'll be able to replay the excellent acting to see if in fact the actors do shade their performances differently when particular scenes are enacted from different characters' viewpoints -- are these takes from the same staging or not? How is each subtly different that we get a different impression each time? Or are we bringing our increasing knowledge (and constantly changing sympathies) about each character to our impressions of the repeating scenes?

One reason this conceit works is because of the unifying theme of obsession - each character is so completely single-minded in their focus on one issue that they are blind to what else is happening even as they evolve to find catharsis. One is literally a heroin addict, but each has their psychological addiction (revenge, co-dependence, hypochondria, jealousy).

The slow revelation technique also works because of the parallel theme of aging and acceptance of the consequences of their actions, as some can face how they have changed and some can't change. You need to see all three films to learn about each character's past and conclusion, as secondary characters in one film are thrust to the fore in another in explaining a key piece of motivation.

The only place they really interchange is in an ironically, meaningless political debate at the public high school they each have some tie to.

This film (which can be seen as a standalone film) is part of a trilogy. Three films, not consecutive, but parallel. Three stories, simultaneous, with same actors, same characters. Main actors in one film are secondary actors in the two others. There are common scenes between each movie, but always shown in a different way, a different point of vue.

"Un couple epatant" is a comedy, with (Ornella Muti/Francois Morel),"Cavale" is a thriller, with (Lucas Belvaux/Catherine Frot), and "Apres la vie" is a drama, with (Gilbert Melki/Dominique Blanc).

You can see only one or two of these movies, but it is really better to see all of them, as each one enlights some dark moments of the two others. The supposed order is the one i used, but you can see these films in any order.

Individually speaking, the films are average (except "Apres la vie", the best one), but globally the experience is very good and very exciting.

My 10-star rating, which I've only given a handful of times among hundreds of films, is for the entire Trilogy. Definitely do not watch this film until you've seen One ("Cavale") and Two ("Un couple épatant"). The film by itself is quite good, but as a capstone to the entire trilogy it deserves a standing ovation.

In this final chapter, Three ("Après la vie"), the story follows a police detective "Pascal" (Gilbert Melki) as he navigates the web of criss-crossing dramas introduced in the first 2 films: a fugitive running from the law, and a perfect marriage falling apart from paranoia. But here we learn that Pascal has his own agenda which I won't spoil in case you've just watched the others. For that reason I won't say any more about the plot because the thrill of this trilogy is to see--and more importantly to feel--it for yourself.

Other reviewers have compared the Trilogy to the holy grail of films "Rashomon" (1950, Kurosawa), and at first I was very skeptical if not outright offended by the thought. "Rashomon" is one of my favorite films because of its mindbending approach: using multiple perspectives to make us question what "reality" is, or if there is even such thing as "reality". Here in the Trilogy we get a modern spin on that approach but with 1 big difference. While the Trilogy similarly presents 1 reality from 3 incompatibly different perspectives, The Trilogy is not a rhetorical, philosophical paradox. Rather, it has 1 clear resolution, 1 clear "reality", and the purpose of the different perspectives is to show the audience--to make the audience *feel* emotionally--how easily we are fooled.

As each successive chapter peels away the mystery introduced in One, we feel our emotions toward the different characters flip dramatically. Rashomon fans may be thinking "yeah Rashomon did that 50 years earlier." The difference, cinematically, is here many of the same clips are shown in each film, and as we re-watch these clips with new information in our minds, our hearts react in an entirely different way. A scene from One that may have made us furious is repeated (same footage) in Three, this time evoking sympathy or even tenderness.

This is a powerful cinematic work. Much like the classic courtroom drama "12 Angry Men" it shows us how truth is bent by prejudice, by judging things based on superficial appearances rather than the whole picture. But in this case, we're not just spectators watching a room full of jurors argue; in this case *we* are the jurors, learning about our own foolish assumptions.

Lucas Belvaux ends his trilogy with « Après la vie», with an ending that seems a happy one, but full of deep melancholy. If «Cavale» was an intense action drama and «Un couple épatant», an entertaining chain of entanglements, in this final installment he opts for realism in the style of films like «Born to Win» and «Taxi Driver». It is because this third film tells us with minutiae the relationship between the police Pascal and his wife Agnes, who is addicted to morphine. And to complicate matters, he is the one who supplies her with the drug. When the plots of the first two movies (the escape of an activist and the suspicion of adultery, respectively) cross their lives, everything becomes completely altered. The arrival of the fugitive suddenly makes Pascal aggressive and violent, because the supply of drugs stops. Pascal (Gilbert Melki, a good Belgian actor with the ideal face for a police drama) cannot control his wife Agnes (Dominique Blanc, extraordinary actress) with her dose at hand. When Agnes asks him for help, as detective to her friend Cécile (Ornella Muti), Pascal becomes confused. Cécile suspects that her husband is cheating on her, and, frustrated by his own emotional life impeded by Agnes' addiction, Pascal believes that he has fallen in love with Cécile. Other subplots are resolved and secrets revealed, as the relationship between the fugitive and a mean pusher, or the sudden confession of who was the real informer responsible for the activists going to prison. However, it is the Pascal-Agnes relationship that dominates the film: it becomes a desperate search for morphine, and absence of love in a harsh society. A great trilogy that I recommend not to miss if it comes your way.

Apres la Vie shows what is happening physically to a drug addict woman and what is the life is for her husband who is a sort of corrupted cop. This is a Al-Anon typical story is the best I ever seen in this type of drama. In the same order movies like Barfly or Leaving Las Vegas are in the same class of movie. I recommend you to watch this movie because it shows a lot in special type of psychologic syndrome. The sole reason to live for the cop is bringing the substance to his wife. The thing is that guy really doesn't know this, she's addicted since ten years all their lives have been ruled by this injection drug.It is an instructive movie and it is totally realistic, it will update your consciousness. Even if it is a dark story the love that the couple is showing is very impressive and sensitive. When the drug dependence goes to the point of a lethal convulsion and if, by luck if you have only a criminal hand to save your life then you will take it. In that state of miserable situation this movie is showing an exceptional way to share a difficult situation in a sort of opportunity. 8/10. A good drama for teachers and students in psychology.

Lucas Belvaux's trilogy of films is meant to be taken as one multi-faceted unit, and is best viewed as such. The first (as I saw them), "On the Run," was a `thriller,' with Lucas Belvaux as a terrorist escaped from prison to settle scores and look up an old flame (Catherine Frot). In that film, there were the first glimpses of events in the romantic comedy, "An Amazing Couple." The trilogy ties up with this character study (or `melodrama'), "After the Life" ("Après la vie"), about the relationship between a pathetic and suffering drug-addicted teacher (Dominique Blanc) and her down on his luck and co-dependent cop husband (Gilbert Melki). The thriller was hobbled a bit by it's involvement with the other interwoven stories, but the romantic comedy and `melodrama' work fine as stand alones, and are even enriched by the angles explored and explained by the other films. All three should be seen together. Or, as a friend of mine has supposed, maybe I should just rent Kieslowski's `Three Colors' trilogy instead…?

Whereas 'One' was a gritty thriller, 'Two' a comedy of errors, 'AfterLife' is a very different ballgame. Quoted as a melodrama on the DVD, its emotional clout, this final instalment of the Trilogy, is immense, churning and raw.

Acted with true conviction of the jackpot lottery that is long-term drug addiction by actress Dominique Blanc and an almost disarming level of devotion from her policeman husband, this is stuff that made me hit the pause button as I found it a little overwhelming at times. Don't get me wrong, this is brilliant stuff but like the real deal, isn't an easy ride. Without adding a spoiler, there is light at the end of the tunnel - as there indeed is for any addict, given love and support.

What made it all the more worthwhile was how effortlessly the jigsaw pieces fell into place from (especially the first) previous parts and rather like coming clean and sober, the veil of confusion slowly lifts. The intense mood of the piece doesn't allow you to think beyond your TV screen - you almost don't have the energy to question 'what-if's' etc. It all goes to show that behind every addict, every killer, every crooked cop, there's a plethora of interweaving stories that form an individual and they're all linked in some way or another.

Other user reviewers have explained the scenario better than I can. But, as such I feel slightly battered and bruised from the experience of it all, and in all honesty not always a totally rewarding one.

That boxset of Belavaux's had been sitting on my shelf for months and I'd not really known what lay inside. One could question as to why practically no-one's ever heard of this trilogy and as to whether it should be better known. The latter's answer is definitely YES, but it isn't for everyone and does require quite a commitment in both time and emotional energy. Christmas holidays may well make space, time-wise, but you, the viewer have to provide the rest yourself.

I just saw all three movies and have to say that I liked them all. They are good each in its own way. Repeating scenes - every time from a different point of view, the same actors and heroes but different aspects. It is not one story told several times. It is more of several stories (or several lives?) entangled and inseparable from each other.

The only negative thing is that the movies are long. So long that I won't buy them on DVD when they will be available (or will I?)

But one thing is sure: I'll go watch the next movie made by Belvaux, whatever it might be. This guy will show me something interesting.

Après la vie is a part of a very interesting cinematographic experiment. The other parts are two other films made by Lucas Belvaux: Un couple épatant and Cavale. The three films are set in the same city (Grenoble in the French Alps) during the same period of time and share the same roles. The point is, in each of the three movies the focus is on different people. The leading actors in one movie are the supporting actors in another one, and vice versa. Some scenes in the movies are exactly the same, some are the same but filmed from a different viewpoint, and most scenes are unique to one of the three movies. Belvaux has chosen three different genres: a comedy (Un couple épatant), a drama (Après la vie) and a thriller (Cavale).

So far, so good. The experiment works: after seeing all three of the films, a fourth imaginary film emerges in which all the different pieces of the puzzle come together. There is only one little problem: not all three films are good. The comedy is not very funny, the thriller is not very thrilling, and only the drama is in a way dramatic. I found Après la vie (about a cop who has to become corrupt because he needs dope for his drug-addicted wife) by far the best one out of the three. But perhaps this is because I saw this movie after the other two and knew the story already more or less. Cavale was the first one I saw and, to be honest, I had trouble understanding everything that happened (although a friend I saw the movie with had no trouble at all). But perhaps this is an inevitable consequence of the experiment. So if you want to enjoy an unusual experiment, go see all three movies. If you think that takes too much time and costs too much money, go see Après la vie - a decent drama - and forget about the other two. Unless you want to admire the breathtaking beauty of Ornella Muti: then Un couple épatant is your best choice because she has a leading role in this movie.

This intense drama of a cop trying to deal with his morphine addicted life puts more pieces in place of the world of stories Belvaux has created. It is fascinating to see scenes that played as comedy in part 2 "An Amazing Couple", repeated here, exactly as they were, but now they feel dead serious because of the change in context.

The only problem for me – and most critics disagree, is that for me this was the weakest of the three films, the acting sometimes over the top, character logic sometimes vague or missing. I felt disappointed, because after part 2 made me like part 1 even better, I was hoping part 3 would raise the whole into more than the sum of it's parts, into 'great film event' territory. Sadly, that didn't happen for me – maybe because I was expecting too much. I'd certainly give this another shot, and it's absolutely a good film, with some very touching moments.

It just felt a little more obvious in how it brought the trilogy's stories and themes (obsession, blindness in service of an idea or need) together than what I wished for.

I loved these three films - trilogy - as I discovered it back thirteen years ago. I loved the scheme, this symmetry existing between those three features, the scheme where a main character in one movie becomes a supporting one in the following one. This scheme reminds me Nicolas Winding Refn's PUSHER trilogy. The stories are not the same as in this trilogy, but the way of frame, structure of those tales is exactly the same. And so unusual too. I am surprised that no one has pointed it out yet. As far as I know, I have not watched such way of telling in any other trilogies. New ways of screen writing are very hard to make, I guess. They prefer the PULP FICTION one or those many movies where several fates collide between the characters. Lucas Belvaux is not a pretty good actor, his way of acting is not convincing at all, but as a director, he's different. He always gives us very interesting films.

The problem of drug addiction is even worse today than 15 years ago when Lucas Belvaux's film was released, and unfortunately he adds little to nothing here.

An attempt at a different approach fails miserably, as the first half of the 2-hour feature is deadly dull - a combination of police procedural and domestic drama. Gilbert is a corrupt cop and he plays the role blankly: all we know about the poker-faced, handsome guy (should have been cast as a gangster instead) is he babies his teacher wife Dominique Blanc in her addiction to morphine (which he acquires illegally through his job) and he is attracted to her friend Ornella Muti (duh!, who wouldn't be?).

Blanc's underplaying for nearly an hour is wearying, until in the second half the script turns from kitchen sink dreariness to overheated melodramatic outbursts, thoroughly unconvincing. Tying up the case he's working on with his wife's predicament is a ridiculous "neat" script ploy, and Belvaux himself intrudes in the nothing role of the arch villain of the piece, played flatly by him.

What this proves is that even a serious approach by a serious filmmaker can end up as routine and pointless as any exploitation film about oft- exploited subject matter. I much prefer the extremes of the genre, namely "Christiane F." on the docu-style well-meaning end of the spectrum, or a good, old-fashioned sexploitation approach at the other.