THE STORY – Seventeen-year-old Jeff stays at film director Blake Cadieux’s wilderness lodge after being invited by friend Max’s family. When strange events occur, Jeff suspects something is amiss with the director and his retreat.
THE CAST – Noah Parker, Arieh Worthalter, Aurélia Arandi-Longpré, Paul Ahmarani, Antoine Marchand-Gagnon, Sophie Desmarais, Guillaume Laurin, Carlo Harrietha, Irène Jacob & Laurent Lucas
THE TEAM – Philippe Lesage (Director/Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 155 Minutes
It’s a classic set-up for a horror movie. A cabin deep in the woods. No way to get in or out except by seaplane. Eight people are cooped up together, one of whom has an axe to grind—scary stuff. However, writer/director Philippe Lesage has other ideas, and in his latest dramatic comedy, “Who By Fire,” he explores something even more volatile: the fragility of the male ego.
For twenty years, film director Blake Cadieux (Arieh Worthalter) and his screenwriting partner Arthur Gary (Paul Ahmarani) had a successful partnership, collaborating on a series of films that garnered them both awards and critical acclaim. But their partnership ended suddenly when Blake, unbeknownst to Arthur, segued into documentary filmmaking and no longer needed his services. Ostensibly, to make amends, Blake has invited Arthur and his family to his cabin in the deepest forests of Quebec. Arthur has brought along his two children — his college-age daughter Aliocha (Aurelia Arandi-Longpré) and his teenage son Max (Antoine Marchand Gagnon), along with Max’s best friend Jeff (Noah Parker). Jeff, an aspiring filmmaker, is thrilled at the prospect of meeting the great Blake Cadieux, but upon meeting Aliocha, his goals for the holiday suddenly become more complicated. Add to the mix Blake’s editor (Sophie Desmarais) and friends Eddy (Laurent Lucas) and his partner, veteran actor Hélène (Irène Jacob), and you’ve got a combustible octet about to come down with a severe case of cabin fever.
What Lesage has fashioned out of these ingredients is a complex human comedy that explores the generational conflict between its young guests, whose lofty goals still lie ahead of them, and their disillusioned elders, whose dreams have faded, though they’d be the last to admit that.
Initially, civility reigns at the cabin (at least for the first few hours) as Blake’s guests scope out the lay of the land. However, resentment begins to emerge once the guests are seated at the dinner table and the wine bottles are uncorked. Tensions are high as the now-lubricated Arthur lays out his hurt feelings at being left behind by Blake, both personally and professionally. Blake counters by calling his friend a sellout, believing that Arthur demeaned his talent by taking a job as a showrunner on an animated children’s show called “Rock Lobster.” The argument does result in one silver lining, though. It triggers a spontaneous conga line to the B-52s song that turns into one of the most delightful dance sequences of 2024.
As for the young adults, they’re content to let the old folks fight it out — Aliocha, Max, and Jeff have their own problems. Jeff announces his romantic intentions to Aliocha, and while she’s not interested romantically, as a friend, she wants to help him work through his sexual anxieties. Meanwhile, Max is creeped out that his best friend is making a move on this sister. And Aliocha soon becomes far more interested in Blake, who is anxious to photograph her in alluring positions.
A secret rendezvous, mistaken identity, unspoken desires — this is the stuff of classic French farce, but Lesage unexpectedly plays them for suspense. At each of the film’s three dinner scenes, for example, the audience tenses as the guests are seated, ready for any threat or accusation to be thrown across the table, always with an unspoken threat of violence bubbling just below the surface. Even those characters with little stake in the confrontations (such as Hélène, Eddy, and Émilie) are not immune, and when a weapon appears in Act 3, we as an audience fear the worst. Yet it is a testament to Lesage’s writing skills that he never loses the film’s comedic side. He often ends scenes with the kind of laugh that makes you want to see what happens next in that narrative arc, then switches to another storyline entirely and makes you want to follow that as well.
Still, it can too often be too much of a good thing. For all the scenes that click, others simply overstay their welcome. When a scene achieves the point it’s trying to make, and it’s time to move on, often the film doesn’t, lingering on and on to the moment where it’s simply underlining the scene’s purpose. Include enough of these overlong scenes, and it’s easy to see how the run time of “Who By Fire” could balloon up to 161 long minutes, which ultimately works to the film’s detriment.
Yet so much of “Who By Fire” works precisely because Lesage imbues his characters with the kind of enormous vitality that keeps us invested in their fate. Like the Leonard Cohen song from which the film takes its title, the film suggests that we never know who will still be with us next year, so we should make the most of the time we have left together. It’s a simple message, but it’s one that “Who By Fire” largely pulls off with imagination and skill.
