Review: Xavier Dolan’s series on Canal+ is his finest creation

Might as well put the cards on the table directly: the author of these lines has a soft spot for the vintage universe of Xavier Dolan. Of Mommy at Laurence Anyways Passing by Just the end of the world, the Quebec filmmaker has developed his own style, sometimes slightly strange and sometimes totally heartbreaking. Author and director of his first film, I killed my motherat only 19 years old, Xavier Dolan can sometimes annoy, by his status as a young prodigy of the seventh art.

However, we assure you: The Night Laurier Gaudreault Woke Up is not reserved only for absolute fans of the thirties. Obviously, if you are already sensitive to its particular aesthetic tinged with atmosphere nineties, you will feel like a fish in water to enjoy these five episodes. But the story of the Larouche family, adapted from a play by Michel Marc Bouchard, will also shake up those most indifferent to its style, we guarantee it.

In The Night Laurier Gaudreault Woke Up, available on Canal+, we discover Mireille, an embalmer who returns to her hometown to embalm the body of her own mother. Nearly 30 years after leaving her family, the forty-year-old will have to face her three brothers, Julien, Denis and Elliot, but above all face a secret that has been put in the closet for too long…

Six Feet Under encounter This is Us

With this family story torn apart by the weight of lies, Xavier Dolan’s first television creation largely tickles our imagination as a series fan. We think of Six Feet Under, Twin Peaks, Mare of Easttown and sometimes even This is Us, following these characters over two temporalities, stuck between the 1990s and the present. But the filmmaker has the intelligence not to use these flashbacks as easy narrative springs. On the contrary, these excursions into the past seem totally natural, simply allowing valuable information to be distilled, bit by bit, about the main characters.

And let’s talk, precisely, about these protagonists of the Larouche family. We first ask for the sister, Mireille, played with disconcerting ease by Julie Le Breton, best known in Quebec. This female character, shattered by the famous event of The Night Laurier Gaudreault Woke Up, stands out as the revelation of the series. At his side are Julien, the eldest of the siblings with dark secrets, Denis, the somewhat lost guy and Elliot, who has just come out of rehab. Together, they make up a family in a thousand pieces, reunited for the death of Madeleine, their mother, embodied by the always prodigious Anne Dorval (Mommy, The Heart has its Reasons).

The Silent Violence of Patriarchy

As often in his filmography, Xavier Dolan portrays independent female figures of rare authenticity, never reduced to their roles as mothers, sisters or lovers. In The Night Laurier Gaudreault Woke Up, women are clearly stuck in a patriarchal society where men’s cruelty and anger wreak havoc. If they manage to partially emancipate themselves from it, by pursuing a political career like Madeleine for example, women still remain prisoners of the damage done by men. For the Larouche family, everything starts from there: from a silent violence, from a burning self-hatred that leads to an irreversible tragedy.

We are not going to reveal here the twists of the five episodes of the series, to keep the surprise intact, but The Night Laurier Gaudreault Woke Up develops a statement on often toxic masculinities and on the guilt too often borne by women when they are victims of violence. A theme already widely discussed by The Handmaid’s Tale Where Big Little Lies, but this miniseries manages to make us feel some real strong emotions for the male characters. All this in just 5 episodes. And yet, we would not necessarily have bet on our attachment to such detestable men, whom we would have rather put in the trash. Only small downside: some scenes of violence, especially in episode 3, are sometimes unbearable, even a bit gratuitous, to our greatest regret.

Nothing is left to chance in the series

If the plots of this Quebec thriller remain largely down to earth, Xavier Dolan allows himself some rather successful forays into the realm of fantasy and fantasy. A way to explore the traumas of its characters differently, while paying homage to classics of the genre. The credits thus evoke the series dexterwhile the music, composed by no less than Hans Zimmer and David Fleming (Dunesseries The Last of Us), summon the best of Danny Elfman, the musical accomplice of Tim Burton.

On paper, The Night when Laurier Gaudreault has woken up may therefore seem to be a surprising, even indigestible mixture. However, the five episodes form a whole of great coherence, sometimes touching on perfection, with shots worthy of the most beautiful paintings. The director of Mommy got us used to delicate sequences, bathed in a nostalgic light of which he alone has the secret. But with this series, he seems to be at the peak of his art: Celine Dion in the background, as usual, baroque sets, mirror effects in a crazy sequence shot, an almost timeless narration… In this series , where everything goes through looks, things left unsaid, but also sometimes through shouting and yelling, nothing is left to chance. A tour de force, from which we come out clearly confused, but above all a little cured of our own traumas. Thank you, Dr. Xavier and Mr. Dolan.

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