Calvaire (2005)

Directed by Fabrice Du Welz
Written by Fabrice Du Welz & Romain Protat


In the 2005 Belgian import Calvaire, Marc (Laurent Lucas) is a singer, although not a particularly talented or successful one. With his good looks and scruffy charm, however, he makes decent money during winter holidays. We first see him performing a maudlin ballad at a nursing home, where two women make passes at him. Gently deflecting the unwanted attention, Marc explains that he's on his way to another gig, and promptly hits the road in his rickety van.

Hours later, on the road, in the dark, in a downpour, his van breaks down. (A word of advice: If you have to travel long distances, through territory where you have no friends and you might run into people you don't want as friends, you can avoid being the hero of a horror film by acquainting yourself with the inner workings of your only vehicle.)

So, an irritatingly odd young man wanders by and says he's looking for his lost dog. He helps Marc find his way from the ailing van to a nearby inn. As our hapless hero's luck would have it, innkeeper Bartel (Jackie Berroyer) is a gregarious man who used to be a comedian, and he's glad of the company Marc offers. (If Marc were smarter, he might ask how a gregarious comedian ends up alone in the middle of nowhere operating an inn nobody visits. But maybe this is the kind of question you only ask if you watch as many horror films as I do.) It seems the tragedy of Bartel's life was the loss of his beloved wife Gloria, who ran off and left him years ago. Bartel's nostalgia for Gloria is matched by his wariness of the people who live in the village a couple of miles away. Bartel warns Marc not to go to the village, because there is something wrong with the residents.

The next day, while Bartel attempts to repair the van, Marc goes for a walk. He stumbles upon several local farmers engaged in an act that seems to support Bartel's warning about the village. Marc slips away and returns to the inn, where Bartel has made every effort to make him feel "at home."

The title of the film is translated as "The Ordeal." And there were several times during the second half when I laughed out loud, thinking it must surely end soon, and not for my sake. There are chilling moments, like the bizarre dance of ugly men in the tavern, that keep renewing the tantalizing possibility of more than the film delivers. But, ultimately, this is a short, simple tale of cruelty and revenge enacted without a breath of compassion.

My sympathies are with Gloria.