Papillon

Prison films are typically a film fare that neither makes one feel warm and fuzzy or uplifts its audience as these prisoners go through their brand of hell. We've seen Hollywood offer its audience many films of this type through the years: "The Birdman of Alcatraz", "The Great Escape", the original "Papillon", "The Shawshank Redemption", "The Green Mile" and the like. Even with these grueling films, we are still fascinated with them. Now we have a reboot of "Papillon".

 

Based on the international best-selling autobiographical books "Papillon" and "Banco" by Henri Charriere, this story follows the epic tale of Henri "Papillon" Charriere (Charlie Hunnam), a safecracker from the Parisian underworld who is framed for murder and condemned to life in the notorious penal colony on Devil's Island in French Guinea. Determined to regain his freedom, Papillon forms an unlikely alliance with quirky convicted counterfeiter Louis Dega (Rami Malek), who in exchange for protection, agrees to finance Papillon's escape. Can this unlikely pair succeed at a tumultuous task of getting off this island?

 

This was grippingly directed by famed French director Michal Noer ("Jorden under mine fodder" (Documentary) '06, "Vesterbro" (Documentary) '07, "The Wild Hearts"  (Documentary) '08, "R" '10, "Son of God" (Documentary) '10, "Northwest" '13, "Nogle hus spejl" '15) plus shorts. While Franklin J. Schaffner ("Planet of the Apes" '68, "Patton" '70), director of "Papillon" was an amazing director, Noer was equally brilliant in his ability to extract that certain element of pain and agony as these convicts were going through a hellish situation. For a documentarian, this filmmaker proved his ability to direct films with a storyline incredibly well. It was equally written well by Aaron Guzinowski ("Contraband" '12, "Prisoners" '13) plus TV, based on the 1973 screenplay by Dalton Trumbo and Lorenzo Semple Jr., which is based on the aforementioned books published by Robert Laffont, Paris, France. Certainly Guzinowski doesn't have a ton of theatrical film experience, however what he has is quality and keeps its audience on the edge of their seats. Other than a couple of small places of slowness, this script rocked. When a screenplay exceeds a two-hour running time, as this does, it is extremely difficult to keep a screenplay fresh and tight and this writer was actually able to pull it off. The original, which starred Steve McQueen as Papillon and Dustin Hoffman as Louis was amazing casting, and there were certain times on this version where I actually thought I was looking at McQueen when Hunnam was on the screen. Casting is everything.

 

I went into the theater with great trepidation, assuming this was simply going to be a mediocre rehash of the brilliant 1973 version, and surely the 1973 version is the king, but Guzinowski's version held my attention easily.

 

Out of 4 Stars: 3.5                                  Rated: R                                          138mins.