The bet was risky: transforming a cult short film made between friends during a Kino Kabaret, that is to say with little financial means, but a lot of creativity and arm grease, into a feature film capable of seduce the fans of the first hour and conquer a new audience. Well, Édouard Tremblay, aka Eddie69 from Cola speech bubble and of Tom and his friendsdeserves several thousand experience points for completing this feat.
Filled with amusing references to Star WarsTo Willow (the film, not the series!) and special effects in stop-motion of the great Ray Harryhausen, farador popularizes the world of tabletop role-playing games so well that even those who were unaware of its existence will feel like they know all its secrets. Modestly crafted, this first solo feature film by Édouard Tremblay once again testifies to the inventiveness of its creator, his sincere love for genre cinema and his uninhibited passion for culture. geek.
Actually, faradorthat the co-director of Dead leaves wrote with Daniel Boulanger, Marc-Antoine Rioux and Eric K. Boulianne, it is the missing link between the trilogy of Lord of the Ringsby Peter Jackson, and Monty Python. Holy Grail!, by Terry Gilliam and Terry Jones. But beyond its whimsical nature and its schoolboy spirit, it is first and foremost a unifying learning story about friendship that is firmly rooted in its time.
Like the short film There farador battlefilmed at the Vitesse Lumière festival in 2005, farador features four young people in their thirties who, preferring to spend hours playing Dungeon and Dragon in the basement of their sinister bungalow in Sainte-Foy, have not yet made their transition to adulthood. However, the mission they have been carrying out “every week for 18 years” has just been jeopardized, not by “bloodthirsty creatures, evil labyrinths and convoluted traps”, but by the departure of Paul (Marc-Antoine Marceau) , moved in with his girlfriend Marie-Ève (Catherine Simard).
She wants chaos
Much to the chagrin of Guillaume (Lucien Ratio), alias Gardakan, level 66 paladin, and Louis (Benoit Drouin-Germain), alias Mordak, level 57 archmage, Charles (Eric K. Boulianne), the game master, seems more motivated to write his erotic-medieval novel, The Talisman of Desire, only to guide them towards the fortress of the bloodthirsty Farador. “A book on dragons that cram, a nice service to humanity, that! » throws Guillaume, a beige civil servant unable to approach a woman in real life, but whom no princess or amazon can resist in his imaginary world.
For his part, Louis, Guillaume’s whipping boy, has a crush on Kim (Catherine Brunet), sister of Charles, who has just returned from Belgium after dropping Tom (Florent Losson) in order to assume her sexual orientation that she comes to discover. The latter arrives a few days later at Charles and his buddies. During a game, under the identity of Foba Bett, level 1 thief, he maneuvers to send ad patres Mordak: “You killed my man! »
Yes, the key sequence of farador is the hilarious original short in its entirety, save for a few minor details—for lack of consent, Gardakan’s “hospitable posterior” has become “a recalcitrant scabbard.” With a swing of their swords brandished in the air, our heroes are magically transported to a fantasy Middle Ages (courtesy of Lassay-les-Châteaux, Pays de la Loire) and surrounded by a horde of barbarians until the worst happens. No need to have seen The Battle of Farador to savor every moment of this joyfully epic passage nor to measure the extent of the drama in the lives of these endearing geek.
The magic of farador, it is not only to have revived these 12 minutes of pure delirium, but to have been able to draw from it a solid story about friendship, coupled with a relevant reflection on masculinity and the quest for identity, where Édouard Tremblay briefly revisits the youth of his characters, whom he then transforms into moving teenagers at a crucial moment in their existence. Escaping the caricature, the actors portray their character and their double with great confidence and contagious happiness. Sometimes funny, sometimes harsh, disarmingly natural, the lines hit home.
Who says friendship also says betrayal and reconciliation. In order to prove that she is not just the disruptive female element, Kim will in turn go into her brother’s “world of little guys”. Never a part of Dungeon and Dragon has never been so thrilling and funny, and its finale so touching. It took 18 years to finally reach the fortress of Farador. The wait will have been well worth it.