K.O.

That's the perfect kind of story that the French movie industry shows to us since a long while now. At least, the basic line, not the whole. The topic is about a ruthless big executive, played by a very convincing Laurent Laffite, who works for a big broadcasting company and who stops at nothing to be the nastiest possible with his fellow colleagues and employees. The perfect SOB...As Lambert Wilson in CORPORATE. But one day, he has a big accident, or more exactly a colleague of his, as revenge, tries to kill him and then his life collapses. You have here a very strange and eerie tale, which is difficult to tell without spoiling it...But this film makes you think of many things about the true meaning of life. And love. Useless to be an intellectual to appreciate this film, only be smart and that will make it.

Although,at least to my eyes ,"Simon Werner A Disparu" was lauded far beyond its station , Gobert's 2017 effort,"KO " promised great things : the first half is downright intriguing,although the main lead's character verges on caricature .Sometimes we think he's been framed a la Boileau-Narcejac.....

But the director does want to sound as American as it is possible :there's the obligatory song in English which goes on repeating "You don't know":smart,huh?As soon as the movie progresses,we feel David Fincher's influence :"fight club ";in Gobert 's work ,these fights bear no real connection to the plot except as a methaphor of life (how subtle!):you have got to struggle hard to survive and make your way of life where they're always at each other's throats;"the game" : the bad man who experiments descent into hell (to redeem himself?) ;"the shooting " is borrowed from "the sixth sense"(1999); the series (?)of dreams is a "Abre Los Ojos" rip-off ;I could go on and on ....

Another problem :there are two many characters ,they are given too little time in the first part,so it's hard to identify all of them in the "return" ...

And of course the unexpected ending : it is a bit smarter than usual ,for it's only the soundtrack which introduces ambiguity;the scene where the big executive has become a humiliated weather report man is successful enough... Gobert builds a disturbing atmosphere ,but ruins it all by using too many tricks the average viewer has seen a hundred times or more .