rowmorg There's no doubt that this is an excellent production and that it deserves to enter the canon of good French films, but there is one big problem with it: Michel Blanc is too young. He was 37 when the film was made, and Sandrine Bonnaire was 22. The age difference is not sufficient to make him a pervert or her flirtation with him bizarre. Blanc does a good job being the weirdly solo Monsieur Hire, but he never looks old enough. There's a lack of shock value in the central scene of her flirtation with him. Perhaps, too, it is because writer/director Patrice Leconte is coy about revealing Bonnaire's nakedness, and that of her killer/lover.

Armand a film about solitude, vulnerability . delicate, precise, impressive. Brahms, Simenon and perfect cast. and a rare science of nuances use. an adaptation. who can be poem or parable or warning. or just pure testimony. about image and its root, about the other as part of yourself, about refuge and love. extraordinary in this case is the brilliant measure. the delicacy of images, the role of puzzle pieces of events, the confession as silence and the gestures as speeches. a movie who can becomes an experience for viewer. not only artistic one - that is, certainly, its first virtue - but a kind of new perception about the other and about yourself, about architecture of relationship and about the search of truth price. beautiful and deeply good.

Sindre Kaspersen French screenwriter and director Patrice Leconte's ninth feature film which he and writer and director Patrick Dewolf adapted from Belgian writer Georges Simenon's novel "Les Fiancailles de Mr Hire" (1933), tells the story of an unsociable middle-aged man called Monsieur Hire who is perceived as a somewhat weird person by his neighbours and has a secret admiration for a young woman whom he regularly spies on from his urban apartment window.This subtle, seductive and witty fable about love, obsession, crime and solitude, is an intriguing study of character and a beautiful drama about a man's surreal crush on a woman. The pivotal music from the always brilliant composer Michael Nyman, the characteristic directing and the endearing acting performances by Michel Blanc and Sandrine Bonnaire is distinct in this late 1980s gem from a great director who usually makes worthwhile films.

benjones-11 Having read some of the negative reviews regarding this film, I think the first thing to make clear here is that there is no point in watching this film if your idea of a perfect movie is Jurassic Park or The Da Vinci Code.This is a film that focuses not on the story itself, but more on the characters and the emotions that reside within them. The above mentioned films take an idea for a story (a dinosaur filled wildlife park or a mysterious religious secret) and then devise a plot which is by far and away beyond what would ever happen in the real world.In contrast, Monsieur Hire takes a story in which very little happens: A man is suspected of a murder. The man is a reclusive misfit, devoid of charm or humour, but he harbours a love for a woman he has never even met: a woman he knows only through seeing her from his apartment window. Unlike the aforementioned films, the plot, from beginning to end, can be summarised within just a few sentences. But it is what is behind the plot which makes this movie incredible. It is the notion of love which drives the film.The acting and directing show passion that is more intense and sexual than anything I have seen, yet it does so without even a hint of what you would expect from a film described as "intense" and "sexual". The intensity of the love shown by the protagonist is beyond anything that one would have seen before, and yet it is far from the purity that one would normally associate with such an emotion. Indeed, it is dark and tense, and due to the questionable character of its object, one is left in turmoil as to whether this love is to be admired, pitied or instead viewed as just desserts for a man of his nature.Those who have scored this low on the basis that the characters do not conduct themselves in a "believable way" confound me. The whole point of a film is that it takes you away from the everyday scenario. Most movies show you fairly ordinary people involved in extraordinary stories. This one shows you extraordinary characters involved in a story which (in itself) is fairly ordinary. To score this low based on its plot is to criticise Opera for its storyline. The whole point of the opera is its music, and the whole point of this film is its incredible portrayal of emotion. Brilliantly acted, brilliantly directed, and this will haunt you for some time.If you need your films to be Hollywood factory typecasts then don't watch this. You won't enjoy it. Go and rent out The Expendibles, and leave Monsieur Hire to those who appreciate art when they see it. I'm sorry if that sounds pretentious. I enjoy a cheesy Hollywood flick as much as the next person, but it's sad that there are people who can't see beyond Stephen Spielberg, Tom Hanks and Bruce Willis.