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I Stand Alone (film)
Encyclopedia
I Stand Alone is a 1998 French drama film, written and directed by Gaspar Noé
, and starring Philippe Nahon
, Blandine Lenoir, Frankye Pain and Martine Audrain. The original French title is Seul contre tous, which means "Alone against all". The film focuses on several pivotal days in the life of a bitter former butcher as he rages against the world. The film was the director's first feature-length production, and is a sequel to his 1991 short film Carne
.
The butcher hates his life with his overbearing, overweight mistress. She backs out of her promise to open a butcher shop, forcing him to take a night watchman job at a nursing home. Along with a nurse, he witnesses an elderly patient die, and he ruminates on the pointlessness of life. He fails to capitalize on the nurse's vulnerability, but his mistress accuses him of having an affair nonetheless. He snaps and punches his mistress in the belly several times, very likely killing their unborn child, then steals a pistol and flees.
The butcher determines to feel no guilt and returns to Paris. He rents the same flophouse
room where he conceived his daughter and begins looking up his old friends, but they are all too decrepit and poor to help him. The butcher's interior monologues focus on his hatred of the rich and their exploitation of the lower class. He looks for butcher jobs, but the French economy is in recession and there are no jobs in any related field. After being turned away at a slaughterhouse that once did business with his shop, the butcher decides to kill the manager. He plots the murder at a local tavern, but is ejected from the bar at gunpoint after squabbling with the owner's son. The butcher finds that he has only three bullets in his gun, and begins assigning them to each of his various enemies.
He eventually decides to see his daughter. After meeting her at the asylum in which she is a patient, he takes her back to his room and hesitates, looking at his gun. He contemplates having sex with and then killing his daughter. The movie returns to the moment of the butcher's hesitation. He puts the gun away, resolving to be good, and tearfully embraces his daughter. He then again contemplates having sex with her in the same manner as he did with her mother.
Standing at a window, he unzips his daughter's jacket and begins fondling her. His interior monologue asserts that the world condemns their love only because it is too pure.
and his girlfriend Lucile Hadžihalilović
. It was shot in an unusual combination of 16 mm film
and the CinemaScope
format. Recording took place sporadically over a period of two and a half years, with frequent budget problems. The fashion designer agnès b.
eventually granted a loan which Noé says saved his production company. The gimmick of having a warning text before the story's climax was borrowed from William Castle
's 1961 film Homicidal
.
According to a 2010 interview, Noé came up with the idea of the butcher character following a conversation he had with his father as a teenager. The Argentinian-born Noé was traveling to his mother's native France
for the first time, and upon landing in Paris
, his father turned to him and said: "They eat horses here" (referring to the French consumption of horse meat
, which is unheard of in Argentina
). Noé then decided that a horse meat butcher would make a great character in a film, and this formed the basis for his first short Carne.
Most of the film's dialogue is the Butcher's interior monologue
, spoken in voice-over
.
The camera is usually stationary throughout the film, but this trend is sometimes contrasted by abrupt, rapid movements of the camera. The sudden movements are always accompanied by a loud sound effect, usually an explosive gunshot. A notable exception is the final crane shot
, which moves gently away from the Butcher's window and turns to look down an empty street.
The film frequently cuts to title cards
that display a variety of messages. The cards often repeat a notable word spoken by the Butcher, such as "Morality" and "Justice". At the film's climax, a "Warning" title card counts down 30 seconds under the pretext of giving viewers an opportunity to stop watching and avoid the remainder of the film.
which is essentially a shortened version. The Butcher also makes a cameo appearance
at the beginning of Irréversible
, Noe's follow-up to I Stand Alone. In a drunken monologue, the Butcher reveals that he was arrested for having sex with his daughter.
Gaspar Noé
Gaspar Noé is an Argentine filmmaker and the son of Argentine painter and intellectual Luis Felipe Noé. He graduated from Louis Lumière College and is the visiting professor of film at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland...
, and starring Philippe Nahon
Philippe Nahon
-Biography:Nahon is best known for his roles in French horror and thriller films, including I Stand Alone, Humains, Calvaire, Irréversible, The Pack and Haute Tension, and he has been featured as a nameless butcher in three films by Gaspar Noé – Carne, I Stand Alone, and Irréversible .-Filmography...
, Blandine Lenoir, Frankye Pain and Martine Audrain. The original French title is Seul contre tous, which means "Alone against all". The film focuses on several pivotal days in the life of a bitter former butcher as he rages against the world. The film was the director's first feature-length production, and is a sequel to his 1991 short film Carne
Carne (film)
Carne is a 1991 French drama film written and directed by Gaspar Noé, starring Philippe Nahon and Blandine Lenoir. It tells the story of a horse butcher with an autistic daughter. At a running time of 40 minutes, it was the first longer film directed by Noé...
.
Plot
The history of the butcher is narrated through voice-over and a montage of still photographs. Orphaned at a young age and subsequently abused by a priest, he opens a butcher shop and fathers an autistic daughter with a woman who leaves him because it is not a boy. He raises his daughter while fighting his incestuous feelings for her. On the day of her first menstrual period, he sees blood on her skirt and stabs an innocent man who he thinks raped her. He is sentenced to prison and forced to sell his butcher shop to a Muslim, and his daughter is put in an institution. He has sex with his prison cellmate, but after being released, he vows to forget it happened. He gets a job working for the fat woman who owns the tavern he used to drink in. She seduces him, and she becomes pregnant. She sells her business and moves to northern France with him, promising to purchase a butcher shop. It is now 1980.The butcher hates his life with his overbearing, overweight mistress. She backs out of her promise to open a butcher shop, forcing him to take a night watchman job at a nursing home. Along with a nurse, he witnesses an elderly patient die, and he ruminates on the pointlessness of life. He fails to capitalize on the nurse's vulnerability, but his mistress accuses him of having an affair nonetheless. He snaps and punches his mistress in the belly several times, very likely killing their unborn child, then steals a pistol and flees.
The butcher determines to feel no guilt and returns to Paris. He rents the same flophouse
Flophouse
A flophouse , doss-house or dosshouse is a place that offers very cheap lodging, generally by providing only minimal services.-Characteristics:...
room where he conceived his daughter and begins looking up his old friends, but they are all too decrepit and poor to help him. The butcher's interior monologues focus on his hatred of the rich and their exploitation of the lower class. He looks for butcher jobs, but the French economy is in recession and there are no jobs in any related field. After being turned away at a slaughterhouse that once did business with his shop, the butcher decides to kill the manager. He plots the murder at a local tavern, but is ejected from the bar at gunpoint after squabbling with the owner's son. The butcher finds that he has only three bullets in his gun, and begins assigning them to each of his various enemies.
He eventually decides to see his daughter. After meeting her at the asylum in which she is a patient, he takes her back to his room and hesitates, looking at his gun. He contemplates having sex with and then killing his daughter. The movie returns to the moment of the butcher's hesitation. He puts the gun away, resolving to be good, and tearfully embraces his daughter. He then again contemplates having sex with her in the same manner as he did with her mother.
Standing at a window, he unzips his daughter's jacket and begins fondling her. His interior monologue asserts that the world condemns their love only because it is too pure.
Cast
- Philippe NahonPhilippe Nahon-Biography:Nahon is best known for his roles in French horror and thriller films, including I Stand Alone, Humains, Calvaire, Irréversible, The Pack and Haute Tension, and he has been featured as a nameless butcher in three films by Gaspar Noé – Carne, I Stand Alone, and Irréversible .-Filmography...
as the butcher - Blandine Lenoir as his daughter, Cynthia
- Frankye Pain as his mistress
- Martine Audrain as his mother-in-law
Production
The film was produced by Les Cinémas de la Zone, a production company run by Gaspar NoéGaspar Noé
Gaspar Noé is an Argentine filmmaker and the son of Argentine painter and intellectual Luis Felipe Noé. He graduated from Louis Lumière College and is the visiting professor of film at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland...
and his girlfriend Lucile Hadžihalilović
Lucile Hadžihalilović
Lucile Hadžihalilović is a French filmmaker. She became the first woman to win the Stockholm International Film Festival annual Bronze Horse award for best film for her 2004 film Innocence....
. It was shot in an unusual combination of 16 mm film
16 mm film
16 mm film refers to a popular, economical gauge of film used for motion pictures and non-theatrical film making. 16 mm refers to the width of the film...
and the CinemaScope
CinemaScope
CinemaScope was an anamorphic lens series used for shooting wide screen movies from 1953 to 1967. Its creation in 1953, by the president of 20th Century-Fox, marked the beginning of the modern anamorphic format in both principal photography and movie projection.The anamorphic lenses theoretically...
format. Recording took place sporadically over a period of two and a half years, with frequent budget problems. The fashion designer agnès b.
Agnès b.
agnès b. is a French fashion designer. She is known for her self-named brand, which includes fashion and film interests.-Life and early career:...
eventually granted a loan which Noé says saved his production company. The gimmick of having a warning text before the story's climax was borrowed from William Castle
William Castle
William Castle was an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. Castle was known for directing films with many gimmicks which were ambitiously promoted, despite being reasonably low budget B-movies....
's 1961 film Homicidal
Homicidal
Homicidal is a 1961 thriller film produced and directed by the self-proclaimed "King of Showmanship", William Castle. Written by Robb White, the film stars Glenn Corbett, Patricia Breslin, Eugenie Leontovich, Alan Bunce, Richard Rust, and Joan Marshall...
.
According to a 2010 interview, Noé came up with the idea of the butcher character following a conversation he had with his father as a teenager. The Argentinian-born Noé was traveling to his mother's native France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
for the first time, and upon landing in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, his father turned to him and said: "They eat horses here" (referring to the French consumption of horse meat
Horse meat
Horse meat is the culinary name for meat cut from a horse. It is a major meat in only a few countries, notably in Central Asia, but it forms a significant part of the culinary traditions of many others, from Europe to South America to Asia. The top eight countries consume about 4.7 million horses...
, which is unheard of in Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
). Noé then decided that a horse meat butcher would make a great character in a film, and this formed the basis for his first short Carne.
Style
Internal monologue
Internal monologue, also known as inner voice, internal speech, or verbal stream of consciousness is thinking in words. It also refers to the semi-constant internal monologue one has with oneself at a conscious or semi-conscious level....
, spoken in voice-over
Voice-over
Voice-over is a production technique where a voice which is not part of the narrative is used in a radio, television production, filmmaking, theatre, or other presentations...
.
The camera is usually stationary throughout the film, but this trend is sometimes contrasted by abrupt, rapid movements of the camera. The sudden movements are always accompanied by a loud sound effect, usually an explosive gunshot. A notable exception is the final crane shot
Crane shot
In filmmaking and video production a crane shot is a shot taken by a camera on a crane. The most obvious uses are to view the actors from above or to move up and away from them, a common way of ending a movie. Some filmmakers like to have the camera on a boom arm just to make it easier to move...
, which moves gently away from the Butcher's window and turns to look down an empty street.
The film frequently cuts to title cards
Intertitle
In motion pictures, an intertitle is a piece of filmed, printed text edited into the midst of the photographed action, at various points, generally to convey character dialogue, or descriptive narrative material related to, but not necessarily covered by, the material photographed.Intertitles...
that display a variety of messages. The cards often repeat a notable word spoken by the Butcher, such as "Morality" and "Justice". At the film's climax, a "Warning" title card counts down 30 seconds under the pretext of giving viewers an opportunity to stop watching and avoid the remainder of the film.
Film connections
The film is a sequel to Noé's short film CarneCarne (film)
Carne is a 1991 French drama film written and directed by Gaspar Noé, starring Philippe Nahon and Blandine Lenoir. It tells the story of a horse butcher with an autistic daughter. At a running time of 40 minutes, it was the first longer film directed by Noé...
which is essentially a shortened version. The Butcher also makes a cameo appearance
Cameo appearance
A cameo role or cameo appearance is a brief appearance of a known person in a work of the performing arts, such as plays, films, video games and television...
at the beginning of Irréversible
Irréversible
Irréversible is a 2002 French drama film written and directed by Gaspar Noé, starring Monica Bellucci, Vincent Cassel and Albert Dupontel. The film employs a non-linear narrative and follows two men as they try to avenge a brutally raped girlfriend...
, Noe's follow-up to I Stand Alone. In a drunken monologue, the Butcher reveals that he was arrested for having sex with his daughter.
Accolades
- International Critic's WeekInternational Critic's WeekThe International Critics' Week , founded in 1962 and organized by the French Syndicate of Cinema Critics, is the oldest parallel competitive section of the Cannes Film Festival. It showcases first and second feature films by directors from all over the world, and has remained true to its tradition...
Award at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival1998 Cannes Film FestivalThe 51st Cannes Film Festival was held on May 13-24, 1998. The Palme d'Or went to the Greek film Mia aioniotita kai mia mera by Theo Angelopoulos.- Jury :*Martin Scorsese *Alain Corneau *Chiara Mastroianni... - Official Selection of Telluride, Toronto, New York, Rotterdam, San Francisco, Sundance film festivals.