Tom à la ferme (2013) Reviews

• Brilliantly tense story and acting all the way through.

  koen_smit2014-03-13

  I was one of the lucky people to see this movie tonight at the Dutch festival 'Roze Filmdagen' (Pink Film Days) in Amsterdam before it will hit the art-house cinemas here in april. It was the opening film and the festival director Werner Borkes made clear in his opening speech that he felt like a very lucky man to be able to show us this movie already. I must say, the expectations were high and growing and most of the time high expectations are hard to live up to. But not this time. Canadian wonder child Xavier Dolan (born in '89) adapted the play by Michel Marc Bouchard, who co-wrote the script for the movie. Dolan is also playing the lead character Tom, who visits the family of his deceased lover for the funeral. The mother and homophobic brother live on a farm and when Tom tries to leave after the funeral, the brother doesn't let him. What follows is a psychological warfare between the characters and the big question is: will Tom be able to leave and does he want to… The movie is tensed from beginning till the end and the music (with a lot of strings) is used well to accompany and strengthen the secluded and somewhat claustrophobic life on the farm. Besides the tension, there is also a lot of humor in the situations and dialog that seems to turn on a dime into an awkward situation for Tom. Especially the part where Tom is talking over dinner about the so-called girlfriend Sara with the mother, who doesn't have a clue what Tom's relationship with her son is, and the brother is a memorable scene. All the actors are great and deliver the lines from their toes. Xavier Dolan is especially one to keep an eye on, this is already his third movie in his 24 years young life and he knows how to tell a great story the right way.

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• A sensual time bomb

  FrenchEddieFelson2019-04-08

  We distinctively perceive the characteristic atmosphere of Xavier Dolan's films: all the characters are on edge or even disturbed, and this dark and sensual film is made with a hyper sensitivity and a keen sense of photography. First at all, Agathe is a mother who mourns her younger son died recently, and seems to understand the whole topic (undisclosed although you do not have to be a genius to intuit it) but represses her feelings and intuitions. Then Sarah a female blonde as hot as lost, and Francis, a farmer who is sexually attracted by Sarah (who would not be?) and hides himself behind a homophobic shell. Right in the middle of this bloody mess, Tom acts, contrary to appearances, like a temporary keystone, the whole microcosm gravitating around him. Although Tom is systematically delicate and cautious, especially with Agathe and even with Francis, in this farm, there is definitely a before and an after Tom, like a bull in a china shop, like a vault without its keystone. A must see.

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• He did it again.

  DrTomatoe2013-11-25

  I've recently seen "Tom à la ferme", and it's safe to say that Xavier Dolan is one of the most important directors alive today. With just 25 years, he has proved to have the maturity and intelligence to make amazing films, which are not only magical in their visual aspect, but in the depth of their screenplays as well. Having said this, "Tom á la ferme" is no exception. Great movie, wonderful to see, and a very interesting story which is, as always, about love. However, every time Dolan shows us his vision of love, he does it in a very different way. This time is about a lost love, and the submissive aspect of it. Brilliant performances as always, all taking place in a very gloomy farm, the authorial work of Xavier Dolan just keeps getting better, so my advice: let's pay attention to this wonderful filmmaker.

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• Complex, subtle, flawed but engrossing

  thomasshahbaz2014-08-09

  This film succeeds in pulling off what "Stranger By The Lake" totally failed to do. The darkness draws you in and intrigues us, and the characters are brilliantly acted and engaging. Some of the editing is slightly strange, or perhaps the narrative would be a better way to describe it, i.e. there are a couple of transitions between scenes where I found I was having to piece things together arbitrarily, in my opinion, meaning I had to concentrate hard. However I'd much rather this than everything being spelled out in children's building blocks as is the way with many American films. This is one of the few "gay" films I've seen that had hardly anything superficial and stereotypical about it, and wasn't depressing to watch as a gay man. Hats off to the guy who played the crazy brother: dark and scary, but the homoerotic tones and suppressed desires sound through his silence, creating a fascinating villain, again, something which the aforementioned other French-language gay thriller completely failed to do, managing only to be faintly embarrassing and ridiculous.

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• Hitchcock would be proud

  rubenm2014-04-19

  In 'Tom a la Ferme', Canadian director Xavier Dolan creates a maximum of suspense with a minimum of resources. Three people in an isolated farmhouse, a secret shared by two of them and the psychotic behaviour of one of them - that's it. Despite the lack of action and the slow pacing, the story is so intense it gripped me from start to finish. Tom is the lover of the recently deceased Guillaume, and visits Guillaume's mother and brother to attend the funeral. But Guillaume's mother doesn't know her son was gay, so the brother makes Tom act as if he was straight, and forces him to talk about an imaginary girlfriend. The brother doesn't hesitate to use violence in order to keep up the charade, and even immobilizes Tom's car so he can't leave. While secrets from the past are slowly uncovered, the situation becomes more and more unbearable for Tom. More than once, this movie made me think about Hitchcock's best films. There is the very prominent soundtrack, complete with shrieking violins. Also, like Hitchcock, Dolan uses location as an essential element in the story. And there are small scenes that add to the unsettling atmosphere, like a dead cow being dragged away, a taxi driver who refuses to enter the driveway of the farmhouse, or the blood on the hands after the birth of a calf. 'Tom a la Ferme' is not perfect. It is rather slow, and some scenes are a bit strange. For example, Guilaume's mother bursts out in hysterical laughter after Tom quotes some perverse language from the imaginary girlfriend. But overall, this is impressive film making. (By the way: there's a very good a cappella interpretation of Michel Legrand's 'Les Moulins de mon Coeur' during the first scene. It isn't listed on IMDb' soundtrack section, but apparently it's by Canadian actress/singer Kathleen Fortin).

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