{"id":7633,"date":"2009-06-24T11:26:38","date_gmt":"2009-06-24T18:26:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=7633"},"modified":"2021-11-12T23:34:23","modified_gmt":"2021-11-13T06:34:23","slug":"going-places-1974","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=7633","title":{"rendered":"Going Places (1974)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>&#8220;If we don&#8217;t know where to go, why not stop awhile?&#8221;<\/strong><\/p>\n<table>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster-233x300.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"233\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-60048\" srcset=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster-233x300.png 233w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster-794x1024.png 794w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster-99x128.png 99w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster-768x991.png 768w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster-209x270.png 209w, https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/Going-Places-Poster.png 855w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 233px) 100vw, 233px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Synopsis:<\/strong><br \/>\nA pair of petty criminals (Gerard Depardieu and Patrick Dewaere) travel aimlessly across France, stealing cars and pursuing women.\n<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p>\n<strong>Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Bertrand Blier Films<\/li>\n<li>French Films<\/li>\n<li>Fugitives<\/li>\n<li>Gerard Depardieu Films<\/li>\n<li>Isabelle Huppert Films<\/li>\n<li>Jeanne Moreau Films<\/li>\n<li>Road Trip<\/li>\n<li>Thieves and Criminals<\/li>\n<li>Womanizers<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Response to Peary&#8217;s Review: <\/strong><br \/>\nPeary correctly notes that &#8220;for about the first half-hour&#8221; of this &#8220;offbeat&#8221; black comedy by Bertrand Blier (based on his own novel), the lead characters&#8217; &#8220;amoral behavior, their vulgarity, and their obnoxious treatment of women will wear on your patience&#8221;, and &#8220;you&#8217;ll find it hard not to hate a film that would have them as its heroes&#8221;. However, I disagree with his assertion that &#8220;once you realize that neither of the characters is vicious and that both are vulnerable, the film becomes more tolerable.&#8221; While I&#8217;m a fan of Blier&#8217;s later anarchic comedies (such as <a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=7441\"><em>Femmes Fatales<\/em><\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=5862\"><em>Menage<\/em><\/a>) &#8212; in which the male leads expose their vulnerabilities and neuroses to humorous effect &#8212; the blatant misogyny of Depardieu&#8217;s Jean-Claude and Dewaere&#8217;s Pierrot in this film is simply too much to stomach. <\/p>\n<p>Peary defends their actions by noting that &#8220;in the long run the two men don&#8217;t do any harm to the women they half-seduce, half force sex upon&#8221;, and that &#8220;the women end up more satisfied than they are&#8221; &#8212; but this doesn&#8217;t make it any easier to watch our whiny, manipulative protagonists accosting a distressed woman (Dominique Davray) while snatching her purse, terrorizing a breast-feeding woman (Brigitte Fossey) on an otherwise empty train, or verbally and physically abusing a naive young beauty shop employee (Miou-Miou) &#8212; not to mention their continuous tendency to steal cars out from under the noses of their owners (a &#8220;running joke&#8221; which really isn&#8217;t funny at all). One vignette near the middle of the film &#8212; in which our &#8220;heroes&#8221; decide to seduce a middle-aged ex-convict (Jeanne Moreau) as she leaves prison &#8212; remains intriguing enough to recommend, given that Jean-Claude and Pierrot finally tap into their gentler natures; but this isn&#8217;t enough to redeem the film as a whole. Young Blier would clearly need to get a more mature grip on his thematic concerns before his cinematic brilliance could emerge. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Redeeming Qualities and Moments: <\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Miou Miou as Marie-Ange (she makes the best of a pitiable role)<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/going-places-miou-miou.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/going-places-miou-miou.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"384\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-7635\" \/><\/a><\/li>\n<li>Jeanne Moreau as Jeanne<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/going-places-moreau.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/06\/going-places-moreau.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"384\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-7636\" \/><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Must See? <\/strong><br \/>\nNo, though it&#8217;s worth a look for its historical importance as Blier&#8217;s breakthrough film. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Links: <\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt0072353\/\">IMDb entry<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.dvdtalk.com\/dvdsavant\/s3713goin.html?utm_medium=Email&#038;utm_source=ExactTarget&#038;utm_campaign=\">DVD Savant&#8217;s Review<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/movies.nytimes.com\/movie\/review?_r=1&#038;res=9503E7D7143CE63BBC4C52DFB366838F669EDE\">NY Times Original Review<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.thespinningimage.co.uk\/cultfilms\/displaycultfilm.asp?reviewid=1424&#038;aff=13\">Spinning Image Review<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.timeout.com\/movies\/les-valseuses\">Time Out Capsule Review<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;If we don&#8217;t know where to go, why not stop awhile?&#8221; Synopsis: A pair of petty criminals (Gerard Depardieu and Patrick Dewaere) travel aimlessly across France, stealing cars and pursuing women. Genres, Themes, Actors, and Directors: Bertrand Blier Films French Films Fugitives Gerard Depardieu Films Isabelle Huppert Films Jeanne Moreau Films Road Trip Thieves and Criminals Womanizers Response to Peary&#8217;s Review: Peary correctly notes that &#8220;for about the first half-hour&#8221; of this &#8220;offbeat&#8221; black comedy by Bertrand Blier (based on&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"><a class=\"btn btn-default\" href=\"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/?p=7633\"> Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">  Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7633","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-responses-to-peary"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7633","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7633"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7633\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78280,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7633\/revisions\/78280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/filmfanatic.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}