Omertà is inspired by a legendary French Canadian series of the same name and lives some sort of revival this summer with a quite well done feature for the cinemas. The movie convinces with gripping characters that are portrayed by some of Quebec's best actors which are the charismatic, old and tough Michel Côté who shines as he nearly always does or the cool, dynamic and eternally young Patrick Huard. Next to this, many other famous actors appear in this movie like René Angelil who does a truly convincing job as mafia boss in this flick.
While the acting of the mentioned actors is flawless, I didn't like the performance of Rachelle Lefevre who is one of the main actress. It's not that she played a rather unsympathetic character who happens to be quite arrogant, bullish and naive because this was probably part of the script but she frequently switches from French to English in her over the top performance which is a quite annoying thing. I know that there are a lot of people around Montreal that are bilingual but it's quite uneasy when those people suddenly switch from one language to the other without any reason and don't seem to be rather skilled any of them.
Concerning the story, there are a couple of lengths in the beginning and you already begin to expect your usual crime flick centered around an undercover investigation. By the end, there are more and more surprises though and the story gets as intense as the excellent acting is. Of course, there are a couple of elements that happen to be predictable if you now the genre well but this film definitely doesn't lack of ideas. There are always some lovely surprises here and there and especially the ending is quite courageous. I was very pleased by the great last half hour of the movie while more mainstream orientated cinema fans might be a little bit disappointed of what happens in here. There is a lot of action, murder and treason in the last third of the movie that permanently keeps the tension high and you on the edges of your seat.
In the end, what we have here is one of the best Canadian movies of the year until now. The movie convinces with a more than solid acting as well as a good average story that evolves to a truly addicting movie towards the end. If you care for Canadian movies and French Canadian culture, you should not miss this film. I'm looking forward to watch this movie again and would recommend a purchase for your home cinema which might be more efficient than a walk to the movie theatres.
