Pons’ film opens in madcap, playful style. The camera
crash-zooms, pans, runs around with its trousers at half mast. Amor Idiota tells
the story of a self-confessed idiot, Pere-Luc who threatens to impale his penis
with a fork at his birthday party. His mordant voiceover contrasts with the
kamikaze edit style. Mr Pons appears to be throwing the kitchen sink at us and
seeing if it will stick.
It does, more or less. Despite the reference to
Dostoyevsky’s Idiot at some point, this is more rom-com than deep psychological
study. Pere-Luc finds the woman of his dreams and pursues her in a suitably
idiotic fashion, stalking her at her house, refusing to take no for an answer,
perusing her with a manic intensity. There’s one brilliant scene where the
lovers kiss for the first time in a restaurant in front of a group of gawping
cyclists. However, whilst the film seems to work best when it captures this
comic energy, it also succeeds in inveigling the audience into an understanding
of the lunacy of love, the way it is capable of tearing down the boundaries of
standard social practice. There’s something akin to the craziness of
Shakespeare’s lovers, lost in the forest of Arden or a midsummer night’s dream
in the way Pere-Luc whizzes around his hometown on his desperate quest. Or like
Rohmer drunk on Cava.
NB: I assumed this film, showing in rep at Cinemateca 18 was
recent. In the process of watching it I gradually became aware of the absence
of the accoutrements of modern urban life/ love. No mobile phones. No email. No
Skype. Only later did I twig that the film was from 2004. Was life really
simpler a decade ago? Or is it that just a trick of the light which Pons pulls
off.
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