19/02/2024 - BERLINALE 2024: Featuring lightsabres, spaceships and a war between Good and Evil set in an everyday human context, Bruno Dumont delivers a hilarious satire to be taken with a pinch of salt

Fabrice Luchini and Brandon Vlieghe in The Empire

"The times are nigh. Darkness rules. La Motrice is at work and will have impregnated the chosen one". You might think you’re watching Lord of the Rings, a John Carpenter film, or being whisked away to "a galaxy far, far away". Well, think again: you’re simply watching a movie by Bruno Dumont, the former philosophy teacher and eminent (and increasingly) iconoclastic arthouse cinema director who has decided, by way of The Empire [+see also:
trailer
interview: Bruno Dumont
film profile] - unveiled in competition at the 74th Berlinale - to push the goalposts even further in his search for a satirical film vehicle to give his ideas wings. But even if we’re dealing with a galactic battle between two antagonistic metaphysical forces fighting for control over Earth (with one of them aiming for apocalypse and the other envisaging a reign of solidarity and egality), the director has once again set his story on the Opal Coast, amidst those "little people" in northern France whom he’s so fond of, to the point of gently teasing them (through works ranging from Slack Bay [+see also:
film review
trailer
Q&A: Bruno Dumont
film profile] to Li'l Quinquin [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], to name the most obvious examples).

It’s incredibly hot at the beginning of The Empire, a film which sees Bruno Dumont seemingly stripped of all serious intent. The two opposing sides swiftly emerge on Earth as in Heaven. In terms of the demons, who ride white Percheron horses, the meta-human clique is led by fisherman Joni (Brandon Vlieghe) who’s father to a babe-in-arms, Le Margat (whose real name is Freddie) who is destined to bring about the domination of Evil on Earth. In order to thwart their dark designs ("the extermination of all races bar one") and throw Le Margat off course, Jane (the brilliant Anamaria Vartolomei), flanked by Rudy (Julien Manier), serve as sentries, their lightsabres poised to decapitate their enemies. Above them, in the clouds, two spaceships monitor the evolution of the situation, one (nestled in a gossamer-thin black hole and consisting of a spectacular palace with assorted gardens similar to Versailles) is under the control of Beelzebub (an unhinged Fabrice Luchini, in the vein of Doctor Strangelove), the other (a space cathedral) helmed by The Queen (Camille Cottin). These two forces ("you know who I am, I know who you are, we don’t mix") can only exist through humans who are undeniably corruptible but who are also “endearing and so funny", and, crucially, they have bodies. The way is clear, therefore, for a definitive showdown, because "here, people are torn between good and evil. Our battle takes place in their hearts".

Buoyed by some wonderfully executed special effects, The Empire offers up a hilarious parody version of the galactic movies which have fuelled audiences’ imaginations to bursting point over the past fifty or so years, Star Wars first and foremost. Intermingling this dimension with an ultra-offbeat and earthly sense of irony vis-à-vis the working classes (with wild sex to boot), Bruno Dumont signs his name to a cult film which also happens to be brilliantly directed. Some might find it all a bit too WTF (the filmmaker balks at nothing), while others will suspect ulterior artistic pretensions, but all we can say to these people is: relax, a little bit of humour doesn’t hurt.

The Empire is produced by France's Tessalit Productions in co-production with Furyo Films, Germany’s Red Balloon Film, Italy’s Ascent Film, Belgium’s Novak Prod and Portugal's Rosa Filmes, and is sold by Memento International.

(Translated from French)

Photogallery 19/02/2024: Berlinale 2024 - The Empire

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Lyna Khoudri, Anamaria Vartolomei, Brandon Vlieghe, Bruno Dumont, Jean Brehat
© 2024 Dario Caruso for Cineuropa - dario-caruso.fr, @studio.photo.dar, Dario Caruso