Les invasions barbares: culture, culture

Les invasions barbares( in English: The Barbarian Invasions) . Canada, french. A film by Denys Arcand. The best foreign film Academy Award 2004.

September 11th, 2001, the world is shocked. An analyst is convinced that it is the start of the invasion of the barbarians and maybe the start of the decline of the American empire. There is no clear explanation who the barbarians are, it might be the September 11th terrorists, the oriental, not clear.

In the same time, Rémy, a professor of history in a university in Quebec is dying in a hospital of cancer. The man, a socialist intellectual, divorced from Louise, has to stay in his modest hospital room accompanied by the ex-wife. Louise calls in urgent their son Sébastien to come, a successful financial expert working in finance market in London, so a capitalist by definition. The son and father actually have no more things in common, and that pushes a conflict between them. The father thinks that the son has no culture since he does not read any books at all, and the son thinks that the father is an unconnected intellectual stays behind a bad university.

The conflict does not have to wait to come. It comes when Sébastien tries to convince his father to move to a better hospital, in United States. Rémy refuses to move and prefers to stay in the very bad hospital in Quebec to enjoy what he says a result of his socialist model of public service, hospital included and to be accompanied by his friends -- not existing at that time. The conflict pushes Sébastien to leave his father andback to London.

Fortunately, Louise succeeds in convincing him, and even better, she convinces Sébastien to ease the death of the old man. And from there, the story begins... Sébastien, using his almost unlimited financial power, ensures first that Rémy obtains better room. Then, he invites all Rémy's friends to come accompanying the father.

The friends here are very interesting. Two ex-lovers, a homosexual yet intellectual couple, and another more normal man with a wife and children. They discuss philosophical, sosial, sex, religion issues together in the new comfortable room. The discussions are very interesting indeed and not lack of humors and ironies. They make the poor Rémy happy and enease the pain he has because of the cancer.

Well, not really. The pain is still there, and Sébastien is again there to help. He provides the father heroins to kill the pain. It is from Nathalie, a daughter of one of the ex-lover, that Sébastien obtains the heroins.

Although the title is confusing, the film is a fantastic film telling how precious friends and life are. The end is very touching, an unforgettable ceremony of death farewell... It is also a film that opens many interpretation that is probably will enrich the film.

The actors are great, Stéphane Rousseau as Sébastien, Marie-Josée Croze as Nathalie, and Rémy Girard as Rémy plays very good. Marie-Josée Croze won the Cannes Prix d'interprétation féminine 2003 from this film.
But, above all, it is the script that makes the film great.