Moll's follow-up to the marvellous Harry, He's Here To Help is an intriguing, oddball misfire: part romantic/tragic drama, part metaphysical chiller, part eco-fable, part blackly-comic ghost story, part satire on French practices in workplace and bedroom. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given all of these elements, the results sprawl out to a somewhat unwieldly 2-hour-plus running time: at least half an hour could profitably be trimmed.

Even with such editing, the fundamental fact remains that Lemming recycles the basic set-up from Harry: both films star Laurent Lucas as a bemused husband, whose complacent middle-class existence is shattered - but ultimately improved - by an unwelcome external force. This time around Lucas is Alain Getty, an electronics engineer/inventor who has been married for three years to Benedicte (Charlotte Gainsbourg). No kids yet: this is, we gather, becoming something of an issue between the pair, who are still very lovey-dovey with each other. One evening they entertain Alain's boss Pollock (Andre Dussollier) and his uber-icy, phenomenally-dissatisfied wife Alice to dinner. This does not go well. Complications ensue.

Lemming is a film which changes mood at several key stages in the narrative - you could almost call them "twists" - and Moll, working once again with Harry co-writer Gilles Marchand, handles them pretty well. But he seems to be straining for an offbeat quirkiness that sits uncomfortably alongside the fundamentally serious events which unfold: the larkish opening sees Alain showing off his latest gadget, a flying webcam. This gizmo - which, if real, would become the must-have Christmas present of any given year - pops up much later on in one of the second half's most amusing and expertly-handled scenes.

But it's still incongruously science-fiction-ish here - and the antics of the titular rodent, one example of which is found lodged, apparently dead, in the Gettys' kitchen-sink S-bend, are something else again. The lemming appears well and truly dead, only to stage a slow, Lazarus-like recovery in the weirdest of the movie's several bizarre scenes. The critter is an intriguing presence, and Moll even introduces a rodent expert to dismiss the myth that this species boasts suicidal tendencies.

How the lemming fits in with the actual story - which revolves around the two couples and becomes increasingly supernatural as it goes on - is anybody's guess, however, especially when the mundane reason for its arrival in the S-bend is explained very late in the day. This is typical of a frustratingly uneven enterprise, in which Rampling (exuding a froideur and hauteur that are extreme even by her screen standards) is the most consistent source of audience pleasure, and David Whitaker's intrusive score the most conspicuous minus.

Neil Young
25th January, 2005

LEMMING : [6/10] : France 2005 : Dominik MOLL : 130 mins (BBFC timing)