Firas

Like many French film this one shows you the inter human relations between Felix and the people he met during his hitch hiking trip to south France. He is supposed to look for his father whom he never knew. On his way to his final aim he gets to know many nice persons and he considers them as family members. In this manner he meets a brother, a sister, a grandmother and a cousin (with whom he had a more intimate relation than that of cousins). These people have different lives and Felix shares with them for some hours or days. All characters are opened and willing to have a human contact with others. Felix is also half Algerian and thus encounters some problems. The film shows a bit the problem of racism and the mistreatment of North African Arabs by some people in France. It showed also the fear of Felix of the police although he didn't do anything wrong. This signalises a possible mistreatment by the police as well! It's also worth mentioning that there is homosexuality in this film. Felix is a homosexual and there are some intimate homosexual scenes in it, so I have told! This movie was somehow interesting for to watch but it was principally nothing special or new! Also as often in French films there are no special effects or great soundtrack. It is worth watching for people who like this genre.

As the film `Hana Bi ` was shown on the screens everybody said it were too brutal. It was brutal but I did not find it that brutal and it had a special human touch of Kitano. `Brother' has also the both sides but brutality was exaggerated this time and the human touch was less than the former film. I would have omitted some of the brutal details but perhaps the director would like to say something with them. It has also it's kind of humor that is sometimes very black!! Since I didn't know so many Japanese I can't say if this kind of humor is characteristic for Kitano or it's the Japanese humor? You can also watch in this film a characteristical behavior of Japanese in some situations and especially that of the Yakusa (the Japanese Mafia) with their very hard disciplinary rules. They prefer to die as to lose. Gangsters of many minorities in the USA are also present in this movie and they show you how each group deals with things in its own way. There is also a characteristical Kitano touch that made endure all this brutality since I don't like violence at all. This differentiated it a bit from other action films. If you are a Kitano fan I think that you should watch this film. Personally I liked `Kikujiro (1999)' and `Hana Bi (1997)' far more than this one!

it's a simple funny film that talks about few people who know each other or get to know each other afterward. The aspect that makes it differ from other movies is that the protagonists sing often their feelings or ideas! The used songs are popular French songs that are well known by everybody in France. I liked it in general but it is not a plot that interests me that much since the most of these relations were not that interesting for me. The most important human aspect that was shown in this movie is that many things are not as they seem to be! Some people show that they are strong and have great achievements and they have everything under control but they are not that achieving! They have to accept that they are only normal people and show their true selves to the others.