Bastion 36: Olivier Marchal still does the right address? (critical)

The filmmaker’s new thriller arrives with the status of heir of 36 quay of the goldsmiths, but never managed to climb to the level of the fabulous thriller of 2004, despite a nervous staging and a solid cast, led by a convincing Victor Belmondo.

It is not a series of the famous 36 Quai des Orfèvres (2004), but it is in successor announced that arrives today Bastion 36 on Netflix. Then the last film ofOlivier Marchal Is he the worthy successor to his big thriller?

After an operation that messed up, Antoine (interpreted by Victor Belmondo) is excluded from the prestigious research and intervention brigade (BRI) and found itself transferred to the Parisian suburbs, with the anti-crime brigade (BAC). His behavioral problems did not help (he made clandestine street fights, necessarily, it goes wrong …). A few weeks later, his former BRI colleagues were murdered one after the other. By whom? For what ? Antoine embarks on a personal investigation, to discover the truth that will immerse him in a spiral of violence and betrayal.

Marchal, faithful to his style, depicts a universe of brutal cops and thugs, an uncompromising life that takes the guts all the time. Its staging is nervous, intense, like its opening sequence of formidable efficiency, which follows a breathtaking motorcycle chase. The approach is always as impactful and always has its little effect.

The big problem is that the script has too much mistakes. In his adaptation of the novel Requiem cops of Michel Tourschereverything sounds false. Nothing ever seems credible. The dialogues are too heavily burned to be honest and we never believe in these characters, frozen in archetypes. Olivier Marchal wanted to offer an heir to his formidable 36 Quai des Orfèvres – Who is celebrating his 20th anniversary this year. Except that his elegant thriller on the police war, faced with memorable face between Daniel Auteuil And Gérard Depardieugives way to a big garish machine, to the coarse mechanics. The strings are so huge (what? The ripou is the guy who rolls in brand new porsche with his police wages?) That we never manage to enter the dark atmosphere of this Bastion 36.

And it’s not for lack for Victor Belmondo to have tried everything. Rising star of French cinema, in the footsteps of his illustrious grandfather Jean-Paul Belmondothe 31 -year -old actor makes a solid taciturn cop, a inhabited investigator, well surrounded by a few second charismatic roles (Yvan Attal,, Soufiane Guerrab,, Tewfik Jallab And Juliette Dol). But the cold and poisonous beauty of 36 of the time was no longer there.