Health & Fitness
DVD Review - It's Not Me, I Swear!
It’s Not Me, I Swear! **½ (NR) This French Canadian dramedy from 2008 offers a bittersweet look at family dysfunction, through the eyes of 10-year-old Leon. Set in 1970s suburbia, he’s telling the tale of his family’s dissipation, theorizing about his own role. Mom and dad are always fighting. Leon occasionally stages a suicide, though his efforts are not as morbidly hilarious as Bud Cort’s in Harold and Maude. The mother - a frustrated hippie artist - decides to split for Greece, leaving the father with Leon and his older brother, even though she was Leon’s only connection to other humans. No one else liked the boy, and he had no use for them, either.
Mourning his new isolation during summer vacation, Leon decides to act out in various ways, including vandalism, acquiring an unlikely partner. His goal is to follow the missing mother to Greece, though he has no money and no clue how far it is from the outskirts of Montreal to the Mediterranean. The film was co-written and directed by Philippe Falardeau a few years before his acclaimed high-school drama Monsieur Lazhar. Leon (Antoine L’Ecuyer) is an intriguing character, who remains sympathetic despite some very bad behavior. The closest analog to its tone might be the British comedy Son of Rambow, though this one is more somber. It’s not always easy viewing, but it’s certainly an interesting character study, featuring a promising young actor. (2/4/14)