Cible émouvante

Plot synopsis:
Victor Maynard (Bill Nighy) is an experienced and efficient assassin living a lonely life in accordance with his family's business. Victor follows a family line of professional assassins, and he completes his assignments quickly and without remorse. One afternoon, after killing one of his targets, he hesitates in killing the pet parrot, Roger, and instead takes him as a gift to his mother, Louisa (Eileen Atkins) an intimidating woman who was, until recently, also Victor's housemate. In celebration of his 55th birthday, she gives him a leather bound book with newspaper clippings of each of his kills from his first to his most recent, leaving pages for future hits to be included. She also expresses concern that he might be homosexual, wondering why he hasn't produced a successor.
Rose (Emily Blunt) is a not-so-average girl with a talent for thievery. Her most recent theft involves the sale of a fake Rembrandt painting (painted by her friend in the Restoration Department of the National Gallery) to Ferguson (Rupert Everett), managing to swindle him out of £900,000. Ferguson soon discovers the swap and hires the best hitman, Victor Maynard, to dispose of her. Victor takes the case and immediately tracks Rose down, missing several opportunities to kill her, and accidentally killing a random stall customer in a changing room. He follows her to a balcony opposite her hotel room and tries to shoot her through the window, but is interrupted by the arrival of the front doorman. Victor sets up a microphone and headset to keep her under surveillance, but falls asleep, unable to listen to their noisy lovemaking. He wakes the following morning, just as she is leaving. He has the opportunity to shoot but pauses.
His mother, Louisa, is disappointed by this missed target (and has apparently killed Roger with a knitting needle) and suggests that Victor apologize to his employer and offer to do the hit for free. He tracks Rose down in a parking garage where he sees another hitman ready to kill her. He takes the preemptive shot, killing the other assassin. He and Rose get into her car, only to be forced out again by Mike (Gregor Fisher), another assassin hiding in the back seat of her Mini. Mike throws Victor's gun away and lines them up on the wall to be shot and killed, but instead is wounded by Tony (Rupert Grint), an apparently homeless young man who had picked up the dead man's gun. Saying it was his first time handling a firearm, he impresses Victor enough to consider a protégé. But he sends Tony home and Victor and Rose flee. Mike starts firing at them and they nearly run over Tony on his way out of the garage, forcing him to join the ride. Rose offers Victor his price of £30,000 a week for her protection, believing that he is merely a private detective. They travel to a luxury hotel where they can lay low, but by chance get a room on the same floor as Ferguson. Ferguson hires Dixon (Martin Freeman), reputed to be second only to Maynard in proficiency, to kill Rose and Maynard. After several close calls, Mike, who is also Ferguson's bodyguard, discovers their whereabouts when he spots a pair of boots that Rose had stolen from his dead partner. Tony is ambushed in the bathroom and nearly drowned in the bathtub by Mike, but he turns the tables and accidentally shoots Mike's ear off before the three of them escape the hotel. Ferguson and Mike pursue them in a high-speed chase through the streets of London until Mike loses control and crashes the car, sending the pair to the hospital.
They travel to Maynard's home, an exclusive farm deep in the countryside, where his furniture is shrink-wrapped and his cat, Snowy, resides with him. Maynard takes Tony on as his apprentice in "private detective" work. One night (after a sensual foot-massage between Victor and Rose), Rose is attacked by Louisa (Victor's mother), who had come back to the house to finish what her son had started. He eventually talks her down and after she leaves, the three of them work on becoming friends. Rose and Tony help Victor celebrate his birthday, and, after a brief period of sexual confusion between Tony and Maynard, Victor falls in love with and sleeps with Rose. Afterwards, his attitude becomes more friendly, and Victor peels off the plastic coverings on all of his furniture and opens up the house. Meanwhile, Rose looks around Victor's room, finding the leather book that his mother had given him and learning that she was actually his target for assassination. She also finds Victor's father's first gun, a Broomhandle Mauser, and steals it for protection. She runs out of the house after making it clear that she trusts neither Victor nor Tony, and returns to the National Gallery, only to find her friend dead and Dixon and his assistant, Fabian (Geoff Bell), waiting for her. They quickly return to Victor's home, and Tony and Victor gain the upper hand when Louisa appears, killing Fabian with a machine gun. Dixon withdraws the old gun Rose had taken from Victor's room and fires at Victor. It backfires, sending the bolt into his skull. Victor, Tony and Rose bury the pair in the back yard and return to their lives.
Three years later, Victor and Rose are married with a son named Angel and Tony has moved in with them. While Angel is playing one morning, Tony comes outside asking Victor and Rose where the cat had gone off to. They look at Angel in awe as he is innocently patting soft dirt into the yard, suggesting he killed and buried the cat. Victor smiles with pride.

Tags: comedy

Review:
Hello, my name is Victor Meynard, I am 55, and I work as a professional killer, would you like some tea?.
This is one of the best examples of black humor I have ever seen.
The sub titles do NOT take away from the excellence of this film.
Jean Rochefort is perfect as the highly disciplined assassin, expertly contrasted by the art thief who's name eludes me.Keep an eye in the background as well for some hilarious gags especially during scenes with the mother.
The black humor might not be as funny to some but if you like it, this is one of the best examples you'll find anywhere.You won't be disappointed..
A Gem. Rochefort plays professional killer Victor Meynard in this  beautifully shot French black comedy.
I rented this  movie  not knowing anything about it and barely reading the cover.
I was immediately drawn into the movie by  Victor's deadpan expression  and uptight  manner and watched his  composure melt  away into plain irritability  at  his foiled  assassination  attempt  on the art thief Renee as she is seen shop lifting.
It then crumbles to exasperation as more things do  not  run  according to plan as he is so obviously used to.
The Corsican gangsters are threatening enough, and the introduction of Guillaume Depardieu as the "all thumbs" Antoine tops off the chemistry and cast adding to the total chaos inflicted upon Victor's usually well ordered life.
There is a lovely scene too where Victor has afternoon tea with his aged but elegant Mother and it hilariously transpires here that she is an authority on poisons and pistols.
A side-effect of this scene is a mysteriously dead Parrot.
It is all underplayed beautifully and the dark humor, characterization  and pace contribute to a refreshing alternative to Hollywood..
Dark Comedy.
If you like Dark Comedy, you'll love this one.
Cible Emouvante, lives up to its name "Wild Target".
An Excellent film if I must say so.
I was Introduced to the film by my French Professor.
I immediately wanted to purchase the film.
It is constantly moving, no getting bored here!
The film is a lot of fun and laughs--ENJOY.
A stylish, funny, black comedy..
A fantastic little black comedy, up there with Kind Hearts And Coronets and A Fish Called Wanda.
This is a very funny film, in a dry, witty way which gives it real style.
The four lead performances are all good, but Jean Rochefort in particular does a brilliant dead-pan in the lead role.
There are plenty of good lines, but the funniest jokes are visual- the synchronising of the push-chair gently bumping the car with the noise of the crash behind, or the re-appearance of the parrot behind Madame Maynard.
And Patachou's cameo in that role (the mother, not the parrot) makes the movie worth seeing alone.
Highly recommended, and worth seeing twice for the subtle jokes you miss the first time.
And if you're wondering: yes, Guilliame Depardieu does have his father's nose..
all Victor Meynard has to do is to kill Renée Darieux.
Victor Meynard (Jean Rochefort) is a seasoned, aging contract killer with a hesitant sexuality, under his mother's thumb.
But his future could be symbolized by a young, naive dispatch rider Antoine (Guillaume Depardieu) whom he wants to initiate to his job.
For his next contract, he has to kill a young female thief, Renée Darieux (Marie Trintignant) who is hunted down by a gang of baddies but unplanned circumstances lead him to protect her and to take refuge in his house.
Victor is torn down between two alternatives: should he fulfill his pledges and get rid of Renée or should he let love prevail for her?Pierre Salvadori may be a minor director, his films bear the mark of a personal work with nothing intellectual or pretentious in them and they should deserve more recognition in the guide of films by Jean Tulard in which each of his efforts has only one star out of four.
"Cible Emouvante" has enough valuable assets to justify its screening.
First, Salvadori's first effort eschews in the major part of the film, an ultra-mapped master plan and is straddling several genres.
Thus, the onset of the film might let the viewer think that the film will be based on the formation of Antoine to the job by Victor.
But later, the director changes way and follows the three main characters trying to escape the Casa Bianca gang who runs after Renée.
The two gangs will rub shoulders in a chic hotel.
And finally, Salvadori steers his work on another way when Victor, Antoine and Renée wind up in Victor's house.
Investigations from the Casa Bianca gang, chases and suspense take a back seat and perhaps the chief key of the film is Victor's personality.
This man goes through emotional turmoil and doesn't know how to come to terms with Antoine and Renée who force him to question himself about his job and his life.These different directions deftly mesh without major clumsiness.
Pierre Salvadori wields black humor and maintains laughter thanks to a shrewd scenario in which he weaves preposterous, hilarious sequences.
And he eschews some predictable moments through unexpected schemes.
And let's not forget potent cues.
At last, a delineation of the characters contributes to the pleasure of the film between the finally fragile Victor, the naive Antoine and the neurotic Renée.
Guillaume Depardieu and Marie Trintignant will meet again in the director's two subsequent works: "les Apprentis" (1995) and "Comme Elle Respire" (1998).Don't expect something astounding but a gratifying, refreshing black comedy with a sense of unpredictable..
Black comedy with French style.
Victor Meynard (Jean Rochefort) is a professional assassin.
Leaving the scene of his latest hit he bumps into delivery boy Antoine (Guillaume Depardieu) and decides to take him on as his apprentice.
Meanwhile art thief Renee (Marie Trintignant) has sold a fake to a Corsican gangster for 900,000 francs.
Maynard is employed to kill her, but he falls in love with her and ends up protecting her from the Corsican's henchmen.
They hide out at Meynard's home, where Antoine and Renee disrupt the older man's eccentrically well-ordered life.Despite the predictability of the storyline, this fast-moving black comedy keeps the viewer entertained throughout.
Jean Rochefort (seen previously in "The Hairdresser's Husband") is hilarious as the anally-retentive assassin whose world is turned upside down, and is ably supported by the kleptomaniac Trintignant and the incompetent apprentice Depardieu.
Also, at 88 minutes the film doesn't outstay its welcome..
An entertaining black comedy.
Jean Rochefort (The Phantom of Liberty) plays Victor Meynard, a 55 year-old professional killer; but he is starting to lose his touch.
He is unmarried, and trying to learn the English language, as well as tending to his Dwarf Ulanus plant, and paying visits to his eccentric mother.
During a hit, Victor stumbles upon a timid young man named Antoine, and decides not to kill him, but learn him the art of killing people in different ways.
Victor is then hired to kill a femme fatale named Renee, who has ripped off a mobster.
Chaos ensues when Victor is prevented from killing her by another hitman, and he decides to take Renee to his house, along with Antoine.The three of them then hide out there.
The three characters are good together, and the film moves along at a good pace.
It is an entertaining and funny film to watch and never dull..
Bullseye.
As black comedies go this is right out of the top drawer.
A year before (1972) Michael Winner's 'The Mechanic' featured a hit-man, Charles Bronson, who takes on an apprentice but that movie played it straight as opposed to this one in which ace hit-man Victor Meynard (Jean Rochefort) decides to teach a delivery boy, Antoine (Guillaume Depardieu) the tricks of the trade rather than kill him when he is a witness to Meynard's latest hit.
Simultaneously flimmer Renee Dandrieux (Marie Trintignant) is conning the mob out of nine hundred thou and when she pulls it off Meynard is given the contract to take her out.
Had he done so there would have been no movie or else it would have been a different one altogether so the three of them go on the lam and hole out in the Meynard family seat where they are finally discovered by Dremyan (Charlie Nelson), the second-best hit-man currently working.
Writer-director Pierre Salvadori has come up with the delicious concept of a family of hit men - one of the most droll moments occurs when Victor, having cooked a roast and set it down on the table produces not a carving knife but a garotte which arguably does the job better.
When Renee enquires where he acquired such an implement he replies dryly 'a present from my mother'.
Mother, in the shape of Patachou is quite a dab hand herself, equally at home with gun, knife, or poison and there's a nice dark gray tagline involving the now-married Rochefort-Trintignant's infant and a missing family cat.
A notable addition to the genre.