Review of Simon Killer (2012) by Patrick M — 16 Sep 2013

An interesting character study, an experience I haven't felt since I first saw "Animal Kingdom", which has now become a favorite of mine.

Simon (Brady Corbet), a troubled college graduate travels to Paris where he wanders the streets at night looking to get laid and meets a nice prostitute who becomes a good friend to him. Later on he comes up with an idea to blackmail married men she's been with to make a large amount of money fast.

The soundtrack is hands down the best of the year, I rushed to download the songs once I finished watching it. Brady Corbet is amazing as the main character, we get to see Simon transform before our eyes and fool not only the other characters but us the audience into thinking we know him.

I felt really involved in the story, it has a similar feeling to "Enter the Void" in a way, but with this I didn't feel nauseous or bored at anytime. Its a very cool movie and I can tell the young cast and director are very talented and I'll be looking forward to more of their work as I've only heard good things of Antonio Campos and I'm a big fan of Brady Corbet in "Mysterious Skin", "Melancholia", and a few other films he's in.

It also reminded me of another character study I saw previously this year by another young director, "Laurence Anyways" by Xavier Dolan, in the way that both have characters that are hard to like, yet understandable. Both films are alienating and seem to be very influenced by the likes of Jean-Luc Godard, Stanley Kubrick, and maybe Michael Haneke I'm not sure.

I read reviews calling it "sexy", "sensual", and stuff like that. It was anything but that, the encounters the main character has with the beautiful french women were awkward and weird, like the sex scenes in "Y Tu Mama Tambien", I don't think they were meant to be seen like that.

I don't think its an easy movie to recommend, but I'd recommend it to cinephiles looking for a great movie, specially whoever liked films similar to "Before Midnight", "Lost in Translation", "Michael (2011)", "The Hunt", "Swimming Pool", "Shame", or any movie I mentioned before. I'd say it's one of my favorite films of the year already, but I still have too many other movies too see.