In “Oh Canada”, Richard Gere is very confused, and it's unfortunately contagious

CINEMA – Seven years later The Three ChristsRichard Gere returns in a dramatic register. The 75-year-old actor (and unofficial François Bayrou look-alike) is the headliner of Oh Canadaalongside Uma Thurman and Jacob Elordi. The feature film by Paul Schrader (American Gigolo) is a very clear bias on the end of life and the last confessions of a man who thinks he has not said everything. Presented as a « jigsaw movie », we can't help but think that it's missing quite a few parts, especially the corners.

Oh Canada is the free adaptation of the novel Foregone by Russell Banks. The film follows the destiny of a man, Leonard Fife (Richard Gere), a former recognized documentary filmmaker and emblematic face of the left after having emigrated illegally to Canada to escape conscription during the Vietnam War. Decades later, as he is dying of a “bad type of cancer”Leo agrees to speak on camera and tell his life story to former students who have become documentarians.

But what was supposed to be a documentary on his career becomes as soon as the camera turns on, the last confession of a dying man intended to shatter his own myth, with his wife Emma (Uma Thurman) as witness. Leonard's mind is clouded by medication, so Paul Schrader chose not to make a linear film. Leo's memories follow one another in disorder, sometimes contradicting each other, because the protagonist is lost. And little by little, the director loses us too.

A kaleidoscope of disjointed slides

Jacob Elordi plays young Leo. That the two actors have nothing physically in common is still okay. But Richard Gere sometimes bursts into his own youthful memories, adding to our confusion. The sequences follow each other quickly, interspersed with returns to the present, sometimes brutal and for no apparent reason.

Leonard's mind is no longer clear, his wife is convinced that he is mixing fiction and reality, and that he “invents half of what he’s saying”. The viewer too does not know what is true, cannot sort and recreate the chronology. Jacob Elordi's mustache (or lack of it) is not enough to guide him. Furthermore, Paul Schrader decided to multiply image formats and tonal palettes, to help us identify the different eras.

Unfortunately, it doesn't work. On the contrary, it adds to the feeling of watching disjointed slides being shown, with no one to explain them to us.

Oh Canada-LLC ARP

Jacob Elordi dances “Oh Canada” de Paul Schrader.

In Oh CanadaLeonard wants to offer as a filmed testament a realistic portrait of the man he really was. A man full of cracks, far from the hero he long claimed to be. But as his death looms, he no longer really knows who he is, and we never will, either.

Oh Canada is a puzzle film yes. But a puzzle for which no one has given us the model, and for which many pieces are missing. Not the kind that end up framed on the living room wall, not ours anyway.

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