The Life and Times of Luc Besson

Picking up where we left off yesterday (you've no excuse to just go read it), where do we find our legend today? The legend being Luc Besson to recap. Well, how about a brief history lesson about Mr.Besson so that you can share in the experience of how he came to be. I'll divide it up into neat bits too, for easy consumption. I'll only consider the full length features that he directed to keep the list accomplished. 

EARLY BESSON

In which Besson grows as a writer/director.

Le Dernier Combat (The Final Combat)

With nearly zero dialog and maybe two minutes of music, this post-apocalyptic survival film relies almost entirely upon plot to move forward. Yet showing his love of character, Luc Besson is able to drive the film forward on a mute protagonist we root for only through what we see of him. An amazing film no doubt and well worth a watch.

Subway

Not going to lie, I need to watch this one again. I really enjoyed it, but the last act of the film always felt incredibly messy to me. Having only seen it once though I can't judge it. The plot centers around an enigmatic man who happens upon sensitive documents and hides out in the Paris Metro subway. While there he gets into a lot of chases, falls in love with a mobster's daughter and starts a band. Yeah, bit messy, but really a bit of light fun.

The Big Blue

Luc Besson's parents were diving instructors in the south of France and as such he grew up loving underwater life and photography. So when he made a film about two life long free-diver rivals, he pretty much knew what he was doing. With a strong question on our perception of life and death along with the idea that we cannot be great without a strong rival pushing us ever forward, this film should have shot right over my head at the age I watched it; the way it presented itself though was simply so watchable though that those ideas were planted in subconsciously. Entertaining film, the ending has stuck with me to this day.

Nikita

A homeless crack addict is caught up by the French secret service (of sorts), forced to be trained and become a deadly secret agent and is then put undercover in a perfect life. Eventually she is called to drop her perfect life (the one she'd imagined would be perfect when she was nothing but a homeless crack addict) to complete her mission. I think Luc Besson really found his niche of action, drama and comedy with Nikita. It's not an easy balance to get, but part of why I think he is amazing is that he does it so well. Ignore the fact that this film got turned into a lackluster American series call Le Femme Nikita, the original has no comparison.

PRIME BESSON

In which Besson shows his full potential

 

Leon: The Professional

Technically speaking the best movie Luc Besson has EVER made, even I can appreciate that (even though it's not the film that changed my life). If you haven't seen this film, you need to drop that sandwich you're eating right now and get it. I don't condone piracy, but well do whatever it takes to see this. Story centers around Matilda, 12, lives in one of the most dysfunctional families you'll see on film. Bitch sister, whorish mother, goblin drug dealing pops and sweetest little brother. Of course when the entire family is slaughtered by a crooked cop (the amazing Gary Oldman) who can she find shelter with? How about a child-like professional assassin as good as he is at his job as he is at drinking milk.

Flawless movie, just flawless. Besson weaves drama into balls-to-the-wall action into questions of morality into comedy into...

The Fifth Element

I covered this film yesterday, so you're welcome to check that out. To recap...fucking tops.

So I have a theory that Luc Besson had this one amazing story he'd been aching to tell since he was a child. That story was The Fifth Element and when he finished it as early in his life as he did, he probably didn't know how to top it. I sometimes fear that accomplishing the life goal you set for yourself invalidates your life from that point on. You've done what you've come to do...now what?

The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc

So Luc Besson decides to take on a historical story of epic proportions. Maybe because he was bankrupt on stories at the time having completed The Fifth Element, maybe he wanted to tell someone else's story, who knows. It's actually one of my beloved Besson films, while being destroyed by critics. I found it to be a compellingly ambiguous argument for and against the notion Joan of Arc was actually sent by God to save France; or was she a raging religious crackpot. Some standout performances from Dustin Hoffman and Vincent Cassel make this a film well worth watching.

Then suddenly Besson stopped directing films altogether. I remember during the time I was anticipating his next film and it never came. I kept holding on until 8 years later when...

LATE BESSON

In which Besson seems to retire from himself 

Angel-A

Almost no publicity surrounded the release of this French only film, but to me it was an event worthy of the rapture. Eight years had passed since my hero had directed and now this came out. I wasn't disappointed. The film centers on a lovable loser, Andre, a troll of a man and his underworld adventures in the French criminal circles. Now with 24 hours to deliver 200,000 Euros he owes to a dangerous man, Andre stumbles upon Angela. Saving her life, she pledges her life to help him recover the money. As the story progresses, Andre slowly, through Angela, gains the courage to be the hero he never thought he could be. But is Angela everything she appears to be...or more?

I loved this film, it was like a breath of fresh air and I proclaimed the return of my hero to his rightful spot as the best director in the world, but I didn't realize it was already too late. For some reason the clouds gathered and Besson decided to give up on himself. Either that or he simply got soft in his old age.

The Arthur Series

There are three films in the Arthur Series. It starts with Arthur and the Invisibles. It's actually too painful for me to talk about so I'll link you the Rotton Tomatoes overview and it'll speak volumes I cannot bring myself to utter. Arthur and the Invisibles ( <--- the link) was the first, Arthur and the Vengeance of Maltazard (another link) was the sequel and Arthur 3: War of Two Worlds doesn't look like it's going to do much better. At just under 50% fresh rating BETWEEN 3 films...why Besson chose to devote 5 years to this series is beyond all understanding.

The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec

I cannot pass judgement on this film until I see it, but from the little I know about it I'm too afraid to watch it. It seems the balance of drama, comedy, action and good concept that Besson seems to master during his prime has warped into an imbalance of camp comedy and no-risk action.

My biggest fear is that I start to resent Besson as a cautionary tale to myself about what happens when we accomplish our goals too quickly.

And so what is my point for this blog? Well tomorrow I'll elaborate on that cautionary tale, I'll lament on the passing of Besson as my role model and move forward with my own journey. Maybe someone will write about me like I have about Besson one day. I only hope I live up to their expectations. 

The Calm Before the Storm

The year, 1998, the year Google was born and the passing of Frank Sinatra. Our young lad having just had his mind blown by blue singing aliens, flying cars and a planet sized antagonist of pure evil stumbles out of the theater unsure of what he has just seen, but it will forever resonate with him.

Over time the lad came to know more about the circumstances surrounding the film and it's history. It made even more sense to him specifically. The director, a certain Mr Luc Besson, had written the space adventure story while in high school, something our lad had been doing up to that point as well (write an epic space adventure that is). The message behind the film, just as we need air, fire, water and earth to survive we also need love (the true fifth element), was so simple and yet could change the world.

Love was the fifth element.

The major life changing impact this film had on the lad was to guide his career of choice from aspiring novel writing to motion picture directing. This was the new goal, this was the new path chosen. The future sight landscape of his life cracked, morphed, transformed and came into clear focus. This single film bitch slapped his world into one fraught with hopes of Hollywood, the BBC or even French film production. He would become a director, write his space novel trilogy into a rip roaring space film trilogy and reach a perceived height his hero Luc Besson, whom he identified with so much to this point, had reached.

Once a legend, the Luc Besson.

To this day the lad still dreams of this, even taking major steps toward this goal. Hustled his way into a film school, graduated. Hustled his way into a film job, doing well. Now though the dream seems so much harder to obtain than it did to that 13 year old. Dreams are volatile that way though, so clear until you try to capture them...then tending to evaporate altogether. Unless you take steps to turn that dream into a reality through the use of goals you're doomed to the fate of Tantalus, forever thirsting and hungering for something unobtainable.

Eventually, you'll get that apple.

While these goals setting to capture the dream are fodder for another distant and hopeful blog (there is always hope), what comes next is the storm. As with all true and perfect stories, there needs to be a second act. One that takes this act and turns it on it's head.

That act is next.