Quicklinks
Top Links
trailers and videosfull cast and crewtriviaofficial sitesmemorable quotesOverview
main detailscombined detailsfull cast and crewcompany creditsAwards & Reviews
user reviewsexternal reviewsawardsuser ratingsparents guidemessage boardPlot & Quotes
plot summarysynopsisplot keywordsmemorable quotesDid You Know?
triviagoofssoundtrack listingcrazy creditsalternate versionsmovie connectionsFAQOther Info
box office/businessrelease datesfilming locationstechnical specsliterature listingsNewsDeskPromotional
taglines trailers and videos posters photo galleryExternal Links
showtimesofficial sitesmiscellaneousphotographssound clipsvideo clipsReviews & Ratings for
Maléfique More at IMDbPro »
| Page 1 of 3: | [1] [2] [3] ![[Next]](http://i.media-imdb.com/f86.gif){kind=small} |
| Index | 25 reviews in total |
22 out of 26 people found the following review useful:
Thrilling and Disturbing, 25 June 2005
Author:
Silberfalke from Switzerland
Well, magic works in mysterious ways. This movie about 4 prisoners, trying to escape with the help of spells, written by another prisoner centuries ago was a superb occult thriller with a surprising end and lots of suspense. Even if it had something of a theater-play (almost everything happens in the cell) it never got boring and it was acted very well. In the tradition of "Cube" you felt trapped with the Characters and even if they were criminal, you developed some sympathy with some of them, only to change your mind by the twists the story takes. Some happenings catched you off guard and there was always a touch of insanity in the air. Altogether intense and entertaining and as I didn't expect anything (a friend rented it), it was a positive surprise!
18 out of 20 people found the following review useful:
Superb!, 13 July 2006
Author:
José Luis Rivera Mendoza (jluis1984) from Mexico
"Maléfique" is an example of how a horror film can be effective with
nothing more than a well-executed plot and a lot of heart. Its cast
doesn't have recognized names, it doesn't have a big budget and it
certainly lacks in the visual effects aspect; but it compensates all
that with an intelligent and well-written script, an effective cast and
the vision of a director focused more on telling the story than in
delivering cheap thrills. Eric Valette may not be a well-know name yet,
but with "Maléfique", his feature length debut, he proves he is at the
level of contemporaries like Jeunet, Gans or Aja.
The film is the story of four prisoners in a cell, four different men
with very different backgrounds but with one single goal: to get out.
Carrère (Gérald Laroche) gets imprisoned after being declared guilty of
a multi-millionaire fraud; his cell-mates, the violent Marcus (Clovis
Cornillac), the intellectual Lassalle (Philippe Laudenbach) and the
mentally challenged Pâquerette (Dimitri Rataud), are all convicted for
murder and give Carrère a cold welcome. Their personalities will clash
as Carrère discovers an ancient book detailing how a former prisoner
escaped using black magic.
Written by Alexandre Charlo and Franck Magnier, "Maléfique" is a great
mix of dark fantasy and horror in a way very reminiscent of Clive
Barker's stories. The movie's strongest point is the way it builds up
the characters, they are all have very complex and different
personalities and a lot of the tension and suspense comes from their
constant clash of personalities. The story's supernatural element is
very well-handled and overall gives the film the feeling of reading a
Gothic novel. Despite being a movie about four men locked in a room,
the movie never gets boring or tiresome and in fact, the isolation of
the group increases the feeling of distrust, claustrophobia, and
specially, paranoia.
Director Eric Valette makes a great use of atmosphere, mood and his
cast to give life to the plot. Despite its obvious lack of budget, he
has crafted a brilliant film that feels original, fresh and very
attractive. His subtle and effective camera-work helps to make the film
dynamic despite its single location, and the slow pace the film unfolds
is excellent to create the heavy atmosphere of isolation and distrust
the movie bases its plot. The very few displays of special effects are
very well-done and Valette trades quantity for quality in the few but
terrific scenes of gore.
The characters are what make this film work, and the cast definitely
deserves some of the credit. Gérald Laroche is excellent as Carrère, a
man at first sight innocent, but who hides a dark past. Philippe
Laudenbach and Dimitri Rataud are very effective too, specially Rataud
in his very demanding role. However, is Clovis Cornillac who steal the
show with his performance as Marcus, a violent and disturbed man who
deep inside only wants to be himself. The characters are superbly
developed and the cast makes the most of them.
The movie is terrific, but it is not without its share of flaws. Of
course, the most notorious one is its the low-budget. Some of the
CGI-effects are a bit poor compared to the effective make-up and
prosthetics used in other scenes, however, it is never too bad for it.
Probably the bad thing about "Maléfique" is that it seems to lose some
steam by the end when it focuses on the supernatural black magic rather
than in the characters, not too much of a bad thing but the ending may
seem weak from that point of view.
Anyways, "Maléfique" is another one of those great horror films coming
out from France lately, and one that deserves to have more recognition.
Valette is definitely a talent to follow as this modest (albeit
complex) tale of the supernatural is prove enough of his abilities.
Personally, this film is a new favorite. 8/10
19 out of 27 people found the following review useful:
Manufique, Malefique!, 1 December 2005
Author:
FilmFlaneur from London
*** This review may contain spoilers ***
If you're one of those who recognise with pleasure such arcane titles
as 'Book of the Dead', 'Book of Eibon' or 'Necronomicon', then you
should feel right at home with Malefique, a film which also features an
occult tome, one with the power to change the destinies of all
involved. Discovered by four French prisoners sharing a cell, the
fearsome object has been placed in the wall there by Danvers, a serial
killer incarcerated back in the 1920s; a man obsessed with rejuvenation
and the black arts before he abruptly vanished. Finders of the book are
Carrère (Gérald Laroche) a company embezzler shopped by his wife,
Lassalle (Philippe Laudenbach) who aspires to be a woman but at the
same time body-builds to execute an escape plan, the halfwit Pâquerette
(Dimitri Rataud) who once ate his baby sister, and the 'librarian'
Marcus (Clovis Cornillac), supposedly driven mad by reading, who
murdered his wife. Reminding the viewer of Meat Loaf's equally bizarre,
bosomy male in Fight Club (1999), Lassalle begins as the dominant
member of the quartet, one who is especially protective of the
infantile Pâquerette. With the coming of the book however, and the
overarching need to decipher its dangerous contents, Marcus assumes
greater and greater significance. At first assured of an early bail,
meanwhile Carrère takes little more than academic interest in events.
Suddenly he too needs an urgent escape option and, as the prisoners
experiment, Danvers' book starts to reveal some of its terrifying
powers...
Staged for the most part within a prison cell, and between four or five
characters, Malefique has a claustrophobic air entirely suited to its
subject matter (as well as the limited budget of the filmmakers). Only
at the start and then at the conclusion do we get to leave the confines
of the cell, a necessary opening out which only serves to emphasise the
doomed, closed-in nature of proceedings elsewhere. More than anything,
this is a film about being trapped, either as a victim of your criminal
past or of occult events now unfolding. "I'm going to escape," says
Carrère at the start of the film, wishing more than anything to be able
to rejoin his wife and son. Whether or not he does it will be at a
terrible price, and the great irony of the film is that the ultimate
form of an 'escape' may not be one a man might imagine.
With all its budget limitations it is greatly to the first-time feature
director Eric Vallette's credit that his film succeeds as well as it
does. As critics have noticed, it is a film with strong Freudian
overtones - Lassalle's distinctive mammaries and adult breast feeding
for instance; the picture of a vagina which comes to life and develops
an eye; the grown man who dissolves back into a foetus; Danvers'
original placenta fetish; the dark cell as a primitive womb from which
'delivery' is awaited, etc. With so many interesting aspects to the
script Vallette hardly puts a foot wrong, and he succeeds in creating a
genuinely unsettling atmosphere out of what, when one comes down to it,
is just a matter of four guys, four bunks, one folding table and a
book. There's a genuine, growing, Lovecraftian frisson as the men
summon up the unnameable darkness from within its pages, while one or
two moments - the aforementioned blinking vagina, or what ultimately
happens to Pâquerette - are unsettlingly memorable. The pacing of many
of the dark events in Malefique is deliberate, rejecting the rapid
cutting of many Hollywood productions: a video culture approach that
often subverts the horrified gaze in favour of quick-fix action and
gore. Perhaps this is a particularly European manner, as one recalls a
similar, measured approach to shocking hallucination taken in such
films as Verhoeven's The Fourth Man (1983) - a film that incidentally
also shares a particularly nasty image based around a prolapsed eye.
Lensed well in 1.85:1, Malefique benefits from excellent performances
and, if for this viewer at least, the conclusion was not as explainable
as it might have been, the journey to the final shot was worth taking.
Coming so soon after the release of the similarly well-received Haute
Tension (aka: Switchblade Romance, 2003), this is another reason to be
grateful that good horror films are once again emerging from the French
industry, this after a time when it seemed the only worthwhile product
came from Asia
11 out of 12 people found the following review useful:
Recommended to curio hunters and "pure" horror fans, delivers on its promise to be "malefic", 9 November 2008
Author:
oOgiandujaOo from United Kingdom
Maléfique is a very interesting movie. It is an unholy alloy of
triumphs and failures. The central concept is great, three inmates with
bizarre personalities are joined by a fourth (who the audience identify
with) and they try to escape from their cell using a book of magic that
they find within the walls of the cell.
The atmosphere is well-woven, it reminds me of reading about the prison
stay of Edmond Dantes' in the Château d'If (prior to becoming the Count
of Monte Cristo). The director sets up the feeling that the characters
are tied to the cell, particularly the character we are meant to
identify with (Carrère - a white-collar criminal whose crime is not
specified, but it's obliquely suggested might be fraud). On one
occasion Carrère dithers when leaving the cell for exercise and has the
cell door shut on him; we never leave the cell, the claustrophobia is
unbroken. There are also no shots of the prison outside the cell, and
the view through the bars is a longing sunset over a generic prison
wall. So even though the film appears to be very modern, it has a very
old world feel of incarceration.
The characters are intriguing. We have Marcus, a violent pre-op
transsexual who plays an abusive mother to Pâquerette (French for
Daisy) a heavily retarded young man. Pâquerette likes to eat everything
he finds beautiful, and unfortunately this included his baby sister,
hence his current predicament (I like this comment on internalisation,
very primitive). Lasalle is a withdrawn, possessed elderly man, in for
brutally murdering his wife.
The central message of the movie is that your desires will annihilate
you, and there's a ritual that goes with that. I think that's what
disturbs me the most, seeing people destroying themselves
ritualistically. It has a real life ring to it. The quite simple
soundtrack backs this up well, every step deeper into the quicksand is
accompanied by the dull ringing of a gong. I'm actually hearing the
gong now every time I do something self-destructive.
I think one of the plot problems is that the ends of the characters
don't really reinforce the message consistently, particularly with
Carrère, also the concept of the book seems to alter throughout the
film, not in terms of a successive revelation either. I also think that
some of the images we see are a bit amateurish, more by design than
execution, such as the famous "vagina eye", and the sodomy of Lasalle,
for me, totally hollow images.
At the end the movie it feels like the director is in a rush to get it
over with, and some things don't seem logical, for example we've been
clumsily led to believe different things about Carrère's child. This
doesn't change the fact though that what we have here is that rare
bird, a "pure" horror movie. There is no comedic dross or genre
segueing, like Cube (1997/Natali), the obvious movie to compare it to,
it's a total immersion experience, where you feel as if you are in the
cell with the characters. This last comment I make about it being a
"pure" experience I think is something others have mentioned as well so
that is a fairly unanimous point.
On a personal note my favourite part of the film is when Lasalle talks
about his past as a librarian. He very vividly describes a scene where
he goes to work one day and sits down in his usual place in the centre
of a room where all the books are arranged in a circle around him. The
books seem to be chanting to him that he will never contain their
knowledge. This prompts Lasalle to go insane. That really is the
problem with an obsession with understanding and knowledge. It's
something I myself have felt.
One final comment is that two of the quite well-received comments on
the board have confused the characters' names. To convince yourself
that Lasalle is the older librarian character, simply click on Philippe
Laudenbach's page and you will see he was born in 1936.
13 out of 16 people found the following review useful:
Scary with some gore, 12 January 2007
Author:
christopher-underwood from Greenwich - London
I didn't feel that this film was quite as clever as it seemed to think
it was but enjoyed it nevertheless.
It is original, although reminded me a little of two other French
films, Vidocq and City of Lost Children, mostly for the colouring but
also for the edgy quality of the close ups of the characters.
Set in a prison cell but do not let this put you off, this film
seemingly goes further than many a multi locationed blockbuster.
Always interesting, with the perennial 'Black Arts' well to the fore
and very good characterisation making some only too believable!
Scary with some gore this is well worth a viewing.
11 out of 15 people found the following review useful:
Memorably freakish and disturbing French trip out, 22 March 2007
Author:
t-birkhead from United Kingdom
I'd waited for some years before this movie finally got released in England, but was in many ways very pleased when I finally saw it. There are a lot of great things to the film, for a start the acting. Its not something I have all that much need for in a horror picture but the people in this film all put in fine work. This and the constantly gripping and interesting script, with a nice sorta Lovecraftian feel to it, give the film a real solid backbone. Add to this the doses of surreal nightmare imagery and occasional gruesome gore and the films a winner. It has my favorite kind of gore too, supernatural and splattery. Also, the characters of Marcus, the angry bodybuilding transsexual and Daisy, his mentally retarded lover/plaything are genuinely freakish and unnerving at times, and give a far out, anything goes sense of morbid grown up craziness which works well with the frequent Freudian overtones. This is one of the most impressive recent horror movies, far more shocking or out there than anything Hollywood can produce. My only gripe was that I wanted the ending to be darker in tone, but it still works, so on the whole I'd really recommend this to serious horror buffs.
7 out of 8 people found the following review useful:
A movie with a uniquely strange atmosphere, 7 October 2007
Author:
dschmeding from Germany
Malefique pretty much has the viewer from start to finish with its edgy
atmosphere. Nearly the whole movie is set in a prison cell revolving
around 4 characters of which transvestite Marcus and his little
retarded boy are way out the strangest. Soon the inmates find a diary
of a previous inmate behind a brick which deals with his obsession of
occult and black magic themes leading to his escape from the cell. From
here on everything deals with uncovering the secret of the book and its
spells to flee from prison. That leads to some accidents on the way out
of the cell into the unknown light.
Honestly I think the story is rather poor and the final twist is nice
but to me the ends are pretty loosely tied together. Anyway I was
thrilled until the last moment because the atmosphere of the movie is
unique with minimal setting and cast. The kills are raw and eerie...
its doesn't take gore to chill your spine and the occult themes are
also done very well and reminded me of the hell themes in Hellraiser.
Malefique has a claustrophobic and cold dirty feel with greenish tint.
At times you wonder if the real or the occult world depicted here is
stranger... when the retarded boy looses his fingers and is lulled to
sleep sucking on Marcus breasts it seems normal, so how strange can
glowing gates to freedom be? With its budget the movie creates a unique
atmosphere and chills the viewer in a very different way than most of
the genre shockers do. I just wish the story had led to a more
consistent finale. Several elements like the visitor with the camera,
the other inmates obsession with books and the toy doll vaguely
pointing to the end don't fit tight in the story. Anyway, I'll keep my
eyes open for other movies from director Valette, although its a
turn-off to see he's is doing a Hollywood remake of "One missed call"
which was worn off and useless already in the Miike-version.
10 out of 14 people found the following review useful:
Original, Intriguing and Claustrophobic French Low-Budget Horror Movie, 7 April 2005
Author:
Claudio Carvalho from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
In a penitentiary, four prisoners occupy a cell: Carrère (Gérald
Laroche), who used his company to commit a fraud and was betrayed by
his wife; the drag Lassalle (Philippe Laudenbach) and his protégée, the
retarded Pâquerette (Dimitri Rataud), who ate his six months sister;
and the intellectual Marcus (Clovis Cornillac), who killed his wife.
One night, Carrère finds an ancient journal hidden in a hole in the
wall of the cell. They realize that the book was written by Danvers
(Geoffrey Carey) in the beginning of the last century and is about
black magic. They decide to read and use its content to escape from the
prison, when they find the truth about Danvers' fate. "Maléfique" is an
original, intriguing and claustrophobic French low-budget horror movie.
The story is practically in the same location, does not have any
clichés and hooks the attention of the viewer until the last scene. I
am a great fan of French cinema, usually romances, dramas and police
stories, but I noted that recently I have seen some good French horror
movies, such as "Un Jeu d' Enfants", "Belphegor" and "Dead End". My
vote is seven.
Title (Brazil): "Sinais do Mal" ("Signs of the Evil")
6 out of 7 people found the following review useful:
Original and inventive - sublime French horror!, 22 May 2008
Author:
The_Void from Beverley Hills, England
French horror cinema has seen something of a revival over the last
couple of years with great films such as Inside and Switchblade Romance
bursting on to the scene. Maléfique preceded the revival just slightly,
but stands head and shoulders over most modern horror titles and is
surely one of the best French horror films ever made! Maléfique was
obviously shot on a low budget, but this is made up for in far more
ways than one by the originality of the film, and this in turn is
complimented by the excellent writing and acting that ensure the film
is a winner. The plot focuses on two main ideas; prison and black
magic. The central character is a man named Carrère, sent to prison for
fraud. He is put in a cell with three others; the quietly insane
Lassalle, body building transvestite Marcus and his retarded boyfriend
Daisy. After a short while in the cell together, they stumble upon a
hiding place in the wall that contains an old journal. After
translating part of it, they soon realise its magical powers and
realise they may be able to use it to break through the prison walls.
Black Magic is a very interesting topic, and I'm actually quite
surprised that there aren't more films based on it as there's so much
scope for things to do with it. It's fair to say that Maléfique makes
the best of it's assets as despite it's restraints, the film never
actually feels restrained and manages to flow well throughout. Director
Eric Valette provides a great atmosphere for the film; the fact that
most of it takes place inside the central prison cell ensures that the
film feels very claustrophobic, and this immensely benefits the central
idea of the prisoners wanting to use magic to break out of the cell -
it's very easy to get behind them! It's often said that the unknown is
the thing that really frightens people, and this film proves that as
the director ensures that we can never really be sure of exactly what
is round the corner, and this helps to ensure that Maléfique actually
does manage to be quite frightening! The film is memorable for a lot of
reasons outside the central plot; the characters are all very
interesting in their own way and the fact that the book itself almost
takes on its own character is very well done. Anyone worried that the
film won't deliver by the end won't be disappointed either as the
ending both makes sense and manages to be quite horrifying! Overall,
Maléfique is a truly great horror film and one of the best of the
decade - HIGHLY recommended viewing!
13 out of 21 people found the following review useful:
France - the new horror-country, 23 June 2004
Author:
daedia from Germany
First of all - I hate french movies. I dunno why, but I simply can't
stand them it seems. I didn't like "Brotherhood of wolves", I was bored
by "Delicatessen", I slept through "Taxi". So one can say that watching
"Malefique" was a big step for me - especially because it was praised
high by people who liked all the mentioned movies.
But I have to admit, this time they where absolutely right. "Malefique"
has a very gripping atmosphere and grabs the viewer from the first
second. The characters are believable (but not likable), the setting is
really claustrophobic and the story has enough twists and turns to keep
even the most cynical horror fan guessing what's coming up next.
There's even enough splatter to keep the gore hounds awake and - absent
from a surprise ending that's not exactly surprising - the movie is
mostly original and doesn't copy anything you've ever seen before. Also
very interesting is that - even if the whole movie plays in a prison -
you won't get the usual clichés.
So with "Malefique" and "Haute Tension" (wich also is great but in a
totally different way) it seems that french horror is again something
to keep your eyes on.
Great Movie 8 out of 10
| Page 1 of 3: | [1] [2] [3] |
Related Links
| Plot summary | Ratings | Awards |
| External reviews | Plot keywords | Main details |
| Your user reviews | Your vote history |
Copyright © 1990-2012
IMDb.com, Inc.
Terms and Privacy Policy under which this service is provided to you.
An 
company.