Rendez-Vous with French Cinema at Lincoln Center 2015

[Chris Knipp]

FRÉDÉRIC TELIER: SK1/L'AFFAIRE SK1 (2014)


RAPHAËL PERSONNAZ AND OLIVIER GOURMET IN SK1

Catching and trying a suspected serial killer the French way

Frédéric Tellier's debut feature is an elaborate polar-noir based on Patricia Tourancheau’s non-fiction book about "SK1" (Serial Killer 1,) the notorious French '80's-'00's Guy Georges case involving a series of rapes and brutal murders of pretty young women. Since it depicts a prolonged and frustrating police investigation, it's roughly speaking a Zodiac-style film. But it has cops and not newsmen doing the investigating, and it's resolved with DNA testing. In the foreground is a handsome young Paris Quei des Orfèvres police HQ inspector, whose progress and growing obsession we follow. There is the wife who feels abandoned, the competing older cop who usurps the case, and the mellow mentor. Tellier's use of such familiar elements doesn't mean this isn't a successful film. With an excellent cast, complex mise-en-scene, and constant action, this is an engrossing police thriller with a distinctive French flavor.

There are two overlapping chronologies. We follow "Charlie" -- the moniker assigned to the rookie detective (Raphaël Personnaz)-- as he comes under the wing of Bougon (Olivier Gourmet) and faces the case's takeover by possessive oddball officer Jensen (Thierry Neuvic). This is a story that covers a decade. But early on the film also joins a two-person team of defense lawyers, with a young advocate (William Nadylam) and the higher profile partner Maître Frédérique Pons (Nathalie Baye) whom he persuades to join him on the case, with her much more reserved about the prisoner's possible innocence.

We also get vivid glimpses and volatile courtroom testimony from the prisoner, (Adama Niane) who has confessed to police interrogators, yet now vehemently protests his innocence -- despite substantial jail time and conviction of rape. Colorful courtroom scenes of a very Mediterranean style of justice alternate with complicated police procedural stuff that includes plenty of images of bloody, nude young female victims (something David Fincer's film notably lacked). Eventually toward the film's end the two story lines and chronologies come together, just as "Fred" Pons and "Charlie" meet and express their mutual respect outside the Quai des Orfèvres building.

We don't know at first whether the killer has been caught or not, though the concurrent focus on the trial somewhat dampens the suspense of the investigations and turns them into flashbacks. What makes this movie interesting is the combination of camaraderie and infighting and the constant grim tastes of the rape-murders, giving us a strong sense of how obsessive such investigations can be and why. Tellier and his writers do an excellent job of keeping all the threads and characters clear. Personnaz is dashing but not the most emotionally rich of French actors -- but the always gritty Olivier Gourmet and the soulful Nathalie Baye make up for that. We may remember Baye as a cop working with an appealing rookie in Xavier Beauvois' touching cop film Le Petit Lieutenant (R-V 2006) -- one of her four César performances. As the orphaned, life-long victim suspect, Adama Niane is interesting, both sensitive and scary, and this is a terrific role for the actor.

SK1/L’Affaire SK1, 120 mins., debuted 24 August 2014 at Angoulême). French release 7 January 2015 to generally good reviews (AlloCiné press rating 3.8) Some French critics found it striking, others thought its Zodiac à la française style a bit too cold and mechanical. Screened for this review as part of the FSLC/UniFrance-sponsored Rendez-Vous with French Cinema at the Walter Reade Theater and the IFC Center in New York in March 2015, its North American premiere.