Léa Mysius’ mystery drama The Five Devils (in the original: Les Cinq Diables) is a frustrating film. It is beautifully made and features great central performance. Its ideas are intriguing, and it looks gorgeous to boot, if in a foreboding, even menacing way. (There are shades of the French series The Returned, and not just in the film’s aesthetics.) There is a lot to like here – but the film is weighed down by misusing a metaphysical conceit that, while it could work well in a different film, prompts the audience to focus on all the wrong things and ask all the wrong questions. What we end up with feels like an incongruous blend of Céline Sciamma’s Petite Maman and the German Netflix series Dark.
A Damn Fine Cup of Culture 