Fantastic Fest 2009

Ah, global warming, you devious bastard. Rising temperatures have had unexpected consequences in Kim Nguyen's Truffe - prime among them the sudden emergence of Montreal as the Black Truffle capital of the world, the tasty little morsels sprouting by the thousands deep below the surface. All that needs to be done is to go and get them. It's instant wealth for all, particularly for Charles - played by Roy Dupuis - the greatest truffle hunter of them all, a man blessed with such a sensitive nose that he pulls up truffles by the bagload from the small truffle mine beneath his apartment. But what with the laws of supply and demand the wealth is only short lived, the sudden flood of truffles causing the bottom to drop out of prices and leaving the miners to scramble for their supper. The miner's life is a hard one, even when their quarry is soft.

 

And life gets harder for the little guy, for the noble independent miner, with the arrival of a strange local fur shop intent on buying up the truffle mines; with big plans for globalization and mass canning. The furriers send out sinister, fuzzy, remote controlled little creations to control the minds and souls of Montreal's hard working men. Surely there is more here than meets the eye ...

 

A hidden gem from right in our own back yard (Todd is Canadian...), Nguyen's Truffe calls to mind the Delicatessen era of Jean-Pierre Jeunet, creating a deliriously off-kilter world for his cast of characters to play in. Nguyen butts images of the deeply absurd up against the immediately familiar to create a totally unique experience, a world anchored by the quietly grounded performances of Roy Dupuis and Celine Bonnier -- also a couple in real life -- as their surroundings spin increasingly out of control. From backyard mushroom mines to the brilliantly lo-fi mind-control fur creatures to gangs of brainwashed door to door salesmen spreading through the neighborhood with full sized, vintage refrigerators strapped to their backs, Truffe is a true visual delight.  (Todd Brown)