I STAND ALONE (SEUL CONTRE TOUS) (1998) - A FILM GUTTER REVIEW

Dir. Gaspar Noe, France, 93 mins

As I’ve intimated before, there are a few gaps in my extreme movie viewing history, and despite the fact that I consider Irreversible a fantastic – if extremely hard to stomach – piece of work, I’ve yet to see anything else from its director Gaspar Noe. Well, 2019 will be the time to put that right, starting with the director’s debut feature fim, Seul Contre Tous – known in English as I Stand Alone. I am aware that this one serves as a follow-up to one of the director’s early short films, Carne, so I’ll be endavouring to get to that one very shortly too. In fact having seen this one I have to say I’m rather looking forward to it, and this one certainly cemented Noe as an excellent director in my own mind.

Philippe Nahon stars in this one as The Butcher, a man who has recently come out of jail for attacking a man attempting to seduce his young daughter. While he has been in prison his mute daughter has been in an institution, and as we come into the story he’s yet to go and see her having been released. In fact I don’t think this movie gets off to the strongest start, because we are fed an awful lot of information about the lead characters in a slightly rushed introduction – this might just be summarizing the events of Carne for those of us who haven’t seen it (IE me) so I was willing to forgive it and keep on watching.

The Butcher is currently living with a woman that he hates, and her mother, than he hates equally. In fact absolute burning hate and rage run through this movie like a river – it’s probably the most furious and nihilistic film I’ve seen since the bleak and destructive Seed, maybe even moreso. The Butcher is obsessed with the idea of justice, and the idea that he has been dealt a bad hand, and those with money are keeping those without money down. His new and pregnant lover has promised to buy him a butcher’s shop in her home town of Lille, but as it grows less and less likely this is going to happen, and The Butcher has to work through a host of low-paid, demeaning jobs, his anger towards her just builds until an explosive scene where she accuses him of cheating. This causes him to snap, punching her in the stomach multiple times in a pretty horrible scene. With this heinous act committed, he takes the mother’s gun and decides to head back to his home town of Paris to start again.

Unfortunately when he gets there many of the same problems stack up, including fresh issues of not having a home to go to and having only a handful of francs to live on. He tries to go to many old work acquaintances to try and get a job, but they can’t help him for various reasons – even the slaughterhouse that used to supply his meat is forced to turn him down. Similarly many of his old friends are down on their luck themselves, and aren’t able to offer him much financial support, although one is able to give him a place to crash for a few nights.

It’s a fascinating portrayal of a character who feels wronged by the world around him, and having been out of it in prison for so long is struggling horribly to find his place within it again. He’s almost a ghost in the world as we know it, drifting through the streets all but invisible. While the plot is relatively slim, it’s pepped up mightily by the endless trail of invective from our lead that illustrates his ever-darkening thought process as his life spirals horribly out of control. Rumour has it most of that dialogue was written by Noe while he was drunk, to capture that kind of sprawling, semi-aimless feeling, and it’s something you could easily believe listening to it. The movie is also punctuated with little visual messages to the reader throughout, including one that encourages you to switch off the film with a final warning before the conclusion plays out. In fact I won’t spoil what this is here, because it was just so strange and dark and fascinating it’d be a shame for you to come to it knowing anything more than that.

As a powerful statement from a new director bursting onto the scene, it’s hard to beat something like I Stand Alone – as a brutal manifesto on unreleased rage and the injustice that can cause it, and a gripping depiction of a life heading towards its nadir, this one packs a serious punch. There are one or two genuinely shocking moments for fans of the more physical elements of extreme cinema, but this a pure howl of rage that amply earns it place as extreme through every seething shot and scene.

RATING: 9/10. I was tempted to go full marks for this one, but I held it back a point for a slightly overdone info dump at the very beginning, as well as some of the camera trickery feeling a bit showy and unnecessary. But overall it’s hard not to be moved by this pure distillation of hatred and inchoate fury. The lead role is superbly played and it kept me absolutely riveted throughout. It’s not a pleasant film in any way – as I would expect from the man behind Irreversible – but again it is a very, very good one to warrant 9/10.