It’s crazy to what extent Quebec’s television winter abounds – or overflows? – fiction series, on all channels, on all platforms, in all imaginable formats.
Like the hepatitis C patient in STATwho also murdered his father in Indefensible, I lose the map and go into convulsions, here. Help, I can no longer see everything and follow everything.
Keeping up to date with my programs is mission impossible, like a Crown prosecutor facing off against a lawyer from the Lapointe-Macdonald firm: he will never win.
Unfortunately for our already shortened nights of sleep, Tou.TV’s Extra adds another very interesting production on Thursday to the pile of stuff to see for the next few days. It’s about psychological suspense Eyes closedwritten by Anita Rowan (Oh) with Magalie Lépine-Blondeau in the lead role.
After wolfing down two one-hour episodes on Wednesday, I would gladly have wolfed down the last four to solve the enigma at the heart of this captivating six-hour miniseries: the suicide of a 15-year-old teenager 28 years ago, would he hide a murder or another event even more murky?
Over the episodes of Eyes closedthe heroine Élise Dénommé (very fair Magalie Lépine-Blondeau), a 38-year-old French teacher, stirs up her past in search of clues that would explain the suicide of her older brother Simon (Léokim Beaumier-Lépine), which occurred in September 1994, in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu.
At the time, the local police concluded that it was a deliberate act: Simon Dénommé threw himself off a bridge and his body was not recovered until the next day. The problem? Simon, 15, did not leave a farewell letter, he was not depressed and no enemies were known to him. Why would he want to end his life then? And why has no one seen anything upstream?
Quickly in this mysterious story, built in crescendo, we understand that the unexpected death of Simon crushed the Dénommé family. Mom Lorraine (excellent Anie Pascale, seen in One way ticket) never got over it and a twisted relationship then germinated between her and her daughter Élise, a lonely woman unable to commit to a romantic relationship.
Memories of Simon’s suicide come to the surface when Lorraine, ready to live in a private residence, puts the family home up for sale. Élise must then empty her brother Simon’s room, a room that has not been touched since 1994.
An old diary, diaries, period photos and an invitation to Simon’s high school convent shake Élise. But it’s an enigmatic message, left on the windshield of her Mini Cooper, that convinces Élise to dive back into her brother’s tragic story, something she has always refused to do.
“We all played a part in Simon’s death, some more than others,” the anonymous note reveals.
Obviously, Élise’s research awakens ghosts and upsets her cantankerous and cynical mother, clinging to her memories. Eyes closed waltz between today and 1994, where the reconstruction takes us back to that glorious era of portable CD players, Pearl Jam t-shirts and depressing grunge.
Moreover, the soundtrack of the first episode – with railway theme – swings between Runaway Train of Soul Asylum and The train by Naughty Penguin. It is delicious.
Three protagonists of Eyes closed appear in 1994 and in 2022, which requires the use of aging wigs and prostheses. This perilous cosmetic exercise works very well on the mother (Anie Pascale) and the pastoral animator, played by Benoît McGinnis. Understand: these two characters (I cannot reveal the identity of the third) do not seem to be wearing Dollarama Halloween costumes, we thank the director Jeanne Leblanc (5e Rank) and producer Fabienne Larouche.
And despite deceptive appearances, Eyes closed does not revisit a classic case of a pedophile priest who attacks teenagers and who confesses his sins 30 years later. The scenario digs deeper into a painful mourning.
In fact, beyond the nebulous circumstances of Simon’s suicide, the series immerses us in a clan plagued by guilt, which has not healed its wounds. In the Dénommé past, it was already tense, unhealthy and full of secrets.
In the present, the unsaid have plagued and tainted the lives of all members of this dysfunctional family. We guess that Élise’s quest for truth (and emancipation) will cause difficult intimate upheavals among the Dénommé, who can no longer close their eyes to their traumas, hence the title of the series.
Broadcast during the next season on traditional Radio-Canada television, Eyes closed only has six one-hour episodes and will not have a sequel. Thank you, good evening, we can close the books, like the eyes, after the credits.
In this tsunami of TV series that invades us, it feels good to treat yourself to a little fast rather than engage in a teleromantic relationship of five or seven years, doesn’t it?