The Five Devils

Considering that superpowers and time travel are central to the plot of "The Five Devils," it's amazing how subdued the movie ends up feeling. If this were an American production, you could easily imagine that the sci-fi elements would've been cranked up to 11, the soundtrack would've loudly proclaimed what kind of emotions the viewer is supposed to be feeling, and there would've been exponentially more hand-to-hand combat. Perhaps thankfully, the French director and screenwriter Léa Mysius chooses to use the fantastical to try and shed light on an intimate personal tragedy in an otherwise quiet village in the French Alps. The result is a messy yet fascinating mash of entirely too many ideas and genres that just about manages to avoid losing sight of a central family drama that's plenty interesting in its own right.

Joanne (Adèle Exarchopoulos) is a swim instructor that has a biracial daughter Vicky (Sally Dramé) with her husband Jimmy (Moustapha Mbengue), a local firefighter. Joanne and Jimmy's marriage already seems strained at the beginning of the movie, and is upended even further when Jimmy’s sister Julia (Swala Emati) comes back to town to stay with the couple after a long time away due to some kind of horrible disaster that happened many years ago. Joanne is clearly not thrilled about Julia being in their home, and tensions run high in the household.

For reasons that are never explained, little Vicky has an extraordinary sense of smell, to the extent that she can not only track people by scent with her eyes closed, but she collects various knickknacks in carefully labeled jars because she is able to access memories evoked by each of the items. This is initially presented as nothing more than a curious hobby for a quiet and introverted child, but when Vicky goes through Julia's bags and sniffs some kind of strange potion, she loses consciousness and wakes up in the past, able to actually walk and live through memories. Things get even weirder when she realizes that the Julia in these time travel sessions is somehow able to see her. Events from the past start to come into focus and collide with the present due to Vicky's little time jumps.

I wouldn't blame you for thinking this sounds like something from M. Night Shyamalan or even a subplot in a Marvel movie, but "The Five Devils" somehow maintains the tone of a low-budget indie drama (which it is). Each scene has plenty of room to breathe and often operates with characters spending time in quiet contemplation, aided by a very low-key soundtrack and gorgeous, desolate mountain landscapes shot by cinematographer Paul Guilhaume. The characters are all fairly muted, not saying much, and often seemingly lost in thought. The always wonderful Exarchopoulos is particularly subdued, while still effectively conveying a hidden pain continually bubbling just behind the surface, threatening to eventually explode.

The approach is certainly effective at keeping the viewer on their toes, but it's very hard to get two questions out of mind throughout. (SPOILERS for the rest of just this paragraph.) 1) If Julia has been severely traumatized due to seeing Vicky as an apparition multiple times in her past, it's incredibly strange that she doesn't react at all when actually meeting her for the first time in real life upon coming back to the mountain town in the present day. Nor does she address this with Vicky in their interactions. I feel like it would be literally impossible to be as calm as Julia was in this situation. And 2) what in the world was in that bottle that causes Vicky to time travel? For all we know, it's just something in Julia's toiletry bag. It even causes other kids to pass out after smelling it, so it clearly affects everyone. Why does Julia have it, and what is it? It's pretty baffling that this isn't addressed at all. I hate to point stuff like this out because I try not to get stuck on "plot holes," but it's a strange choice to not even address these things, and it's even harder for the viewer to not get frustrated for the lack of answers.

The movie also wants to comment on a lot of different societal ills, but never really says much about any of them. Vicky is bullied for her lovely and large hair, cruelly teased as "Toilet Brush" by the schoolkids. Joanne's bisexuality is met with derision by her father. There are lot of bits related to the kinds of intolerance that small towns are known for. I don't think any of these things needed a fully realized treatise or anything, but there is already so much going on in the movie that those things seem almost tacked on as an afterthought.

All that being said, I really enjoyed this unique blend of genres and welcomed a creative approach at allowing us to look back on past events without resorting to exposition or simple flashbacks. Only time will tell if this stays with me (and my fondness for time travel stories may be slightly inflating the rating), but I think what the movie lacks in cohesion is more than made up for with its exciting unpredictability.