''Amer'' is a 2009 Belgian-French
thriller horror film
Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit fear or disgust in its audience for entertainment purposes.
Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements include monsters, apoca ...
written and directed by
Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani
Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani are husband-and-wife filmmakers based in Brussels, Belgium. They have worked as a writing and directing team for their entire professional film careers.
Their most acclaimed works include ''Amer'' (2009), '' The S ...
and starring Cassandra Forêt, Bianca Maria D'Amato, Charlotte Eugène Guibeaud, and Marie Bos. The film is a ''
giallo
In Italian cinema, ''Giallo'' (; plural ''gialli'', from ''giallo'', Italian for yellow) is a genre of mystery fiction and thrillers that often contains slasher, crime fiction, psychological thriller, psychological horror, sexploitation, and, ...
'' in three parts. The plot of the film follows the sexual development of Ana who lives on the
French Riviera
The French Riviera (known in French as the ; oc, Còsta d'Azur ; literal translation " Azure Coast") is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeast corner of France. There is no official boundary, but it is usually considered to extend fro ...
. The film focuses on her oppressive teenage years leading to her womanhood.
The film premiered in Sweden in 2009. It has received generally favorable reviews and was nominated for the
Magritte Award for Best Film
The Magritte Award for Best Film ( French: Magritte du meilleur film) is an award presented annually by the Académie André Delvaux. It is one of the Magritte Awards, which were established to recognize excellence in Belgian cinematic achievement ...
.
Plot
Cast
* Cassandra Forêt as Ana (child)
* Charlotte Eugène Guibeaud as Ana (teenager) - (credited as Charlotte Eugène Guibbaud)
* Marie Bos as Ana (adult)
* Delphine Brual as Graziella
* Harry Cleven as Taximan
* Bianca Maria D'Amato as The Mother
* Bernard Marbaix as The dead grandfather
* Jean-Michel Vovk as The father
Production
To fund the film's production, Belgian producer Eve Commenge created a company to produce ''Amer''.
Directors Hélène Cattet and Bruno Forzani required more funding outside Belgium and searched for a French co-producer. Producer
François Cognard agreed to co-produce the film.
The directors found that they only had one third of their original budget, but the producers let them start production regardless based on their experience of making short films for very little money.
The directors took great preparations before shooting the actors due to the film's low budget. All shots in the film were tested with digital video cameras with the two directors playing all the parts so that nothing unexpected would come up when they began filming with the other actors.
The film was shot at the
French Riviera
The French Riviera (known in French as the ; oc, Còsta d'Azur ; literal translation " Azure Coast") is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeast corner of France. There is no official boundary, but it is usually considered to extend fro ...
and in
Belgium
Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...
. It took 39 days to shoot.
Release
''Amer'' had its world premiere at the 2009
Lund International Fantastic Film Festival
The Lund International Fantastic Film Festival ( sv, Fantastisk Filmfestival, abbreviated FFF or LIFFF) is a popular film festival in Lund in southern Sweden that mainly shows fantasy, science fiction and horror films. LIFFF is the largest fanta ...
in Sweden. The film won The Blade award which was the first time it was given at the festival.
The film was shown at other film festivals as well, including the
Sitges Film Festival
The Sitges Film Festival ( ca, Festival Internacional de Cinema Fantàstic de Catalunya, links=no) is an annual film festival held in Sitges, Spain, specialized in fantasy and horror films, of which it is considered one of the world's foremost in ...
in Spain where the directors won the award for Discovery Motion Picture Diploma.
Reception
''Amer'' was received very well by American critics on its original release. The film ranking website
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
reports a 79% approval rating, based on 29 reviews, with an
average score of 6.84/10.
At
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, the film has received an
average
In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...
score of 72, based on seven reviews. The ''
Village Voice
''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture paper, known for being the country's first alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Mailer, the ''Voice'' began as a platform for the creat ...
'' gave the film a positive review, stating that "The pleasures of this gorgeous, clever, and visceral film are almost exclusively aesthetic" as well as "that those unmoved or alienated by the porn of pain may be left flopping as nervelessly as one of the movie's severed limbs."
The ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...
'' referred to the film as "Consistently outrageous and relentlessly surreal, the Belgian film is, intentionally or not, frequently funny; it's also compelling and distinctive."
''
Empire
An empire is a "political unit" made up of several territories and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the empire (sometimes referred to as the metropole) ex ...
'' gave the film three out of five stars, recommending it for fans of
Dario Argento
Dario Argento (; born 7 September 1940) is an Italian film director, producer, screenwriter, actor and film critic, critic. His influential work in the horror film, horror genre during the 1970s and 1980s, particularly in the subgenre known as ...
.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Amer
2009 films
2009 horror films
2000s horror thriller films
French horror thriller films
Belgian horror thriller films
Films set in France
Films shot in Belgium
Films shot in France
Giallo films
Films scored by Ennio Morricone
Films scored by Stelvio Cipriani
Films scored by Bruno Nicolai
2000s English-language films
2000s French films