L'Homme de la cave

This fast paced French production, tells the disquieting story of a family who sells their dreary cellar to a stranger, bringing unique challenges to individual members. This is one of those entertainments that can throw you off balance, as you follow the wide range of challenging influences - that one person can inflict on a diverse group of people, in a divided society. It offers many thought provoking themes to decipher - including the unjustified annihilation and removal of races from their homelands - to those questioning the Holocaust, and the repulsiveness of anti-Semitism. Also under the microscope is an examination of how easy it can be for youth, to fail to fully understand various crimes against humanity, committed before they were born.

Like the very different Walter Mosley book this adaptation is based on, it's not always fully clear what point of view writer/director Philippe Le Guay is focusing on - forcing the audience to make their own choices or see things from several perspectives. This ambiguous approach won't please all viewers. There's also much to consider about the degree of control, we as humans, are required to exercise when faced with a range of rapidly escalating situations - challenging our everyday lives. Eerie old locations, good production values, and strong performances bring this, at times, confronting thought provoker to vivid life.

This movie is all about negationist and the consequences with democracy.

The acting is true regarding the situation and the age of the protagonists.

It brings back sad memories of the french collaboration.

Very well acted but poor script. If you don't know how to finish a movie, do not start it. The spectators pay to be told a story and not to invent it themselves.

This movie approaches the delicate topic of antisemitism in a very, very surprising way !

Probably only the French could achieve this !

Very good screenplay and great casting !

Far from his usual awful comedies, François Cluet shines bright in this Hitchcock like story, the kind of topic that the American film industry could also give. It is riveting, intriguing, you are stuck to your seat and it is impossible to do something else whilst watching this film. Acting is over the top with Jeremy Renier and Berenice Béjo. It is so exciting not to be bored by a film, there are so many lousy of them these days. I guess there are many cases like this one every week in France and many audiences could be concerned by this story. I will not spoil it any further but please try it. It is like a rollercoaster, it gets more and more exciting.....And the last thing which I wanted to emphasize on is that movie denounces the denial of Holocaust and Shoah, but in the same time, it points out that Shoah must not let people forget that there also were twelve millions Indians slaughtered during Conquest of the West; See what I mean? Very interesting point of view concerning a film denoucing Auschwitz horrors. But the overall meszge of the film is somewhere very ambiguous, it lest open much much much thinking.... MUCH after viewing.