In the Electric Mist (2009)
Directed by Bertrand Tavernier

Film Review

The fetid, mist-shrouded swamps of the Deep South carry an unmistakable stench of moral decay in Bertrand Tavernier's most recent crime drama, an inspired adaptation of a novel by the celebrated American crime writer James Lee Burke.  In the Electric Mist (a.k.a. Dans la brume électrique) may be Tavernier's first film to be shot in the United States but the distinguished French filmmaker has already demonstrated his affinity for American culture, via his book Amis américains, in which he interviews several leading lights of Hollywood, and his two film tributes to American jazz, Mississippi Blues (1983) and 'Round Midnight (1986).  Tavernier has been a particular devotee of James Lee Burke's work for many years, so the making of In the Electric Mist was the fulfilment of a long-held personal ambition.  It is his first crime film since L'Appât (1995), one of the most provocative French films of the 1990s.  Although it was filmed in the state of Louisiana with a predominantly American cast and crew, In the Electric Mist was an entirely French financed production and did not get a theatrical release in the United States (it went to DVD straight after its premiere in the spring of 2009).

Burke's 1993 novel In the Electric Mist with Confederate Dead is faithfully rendered by Tavernier but is given a characteristically French policier slant, allowing the director to revisit his favourite themes (racial intolerance and abuse of power by authority figures) whilst making it more of a psychological study than a conventional plot-driven crime drama.  The film has an unmistakeable political resonance, touching on the Bush administration's appalling handling of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which did little to alleviate an unimaginable level of human suffering whilst allowing hundreds of millions of dollars in aid and reconstruction money to be siphoned off by the Mafia.  In both its crime-riddled setting and morally ambiguous central protagonist, there is a close similarity with Tavernier's previous (and arguably greatest) film Coup de torchon (1980), which is also adapted from an American crime novel (one by Jim Thompson).

In the Electric Mist may have the look and feel of a modern film noir thriller, but it is far from being a conventional crime drama.  The details of the plot are vague and the exposition pretty messy for the most part, but this hardly matters.  Tavernier's main interest is not the humdrum mechanics of a murder investigation but the psychology of the central character.  Dave Robicheaux is a cop who seems to have the most tenuous grip on reality.  Not only does he appear to have an ethical deficit (planting incriminating evidence and beating up suspects is all part of his daily routine); he looks as if he is teetering on the brink of total mental collapse.  Caught up in a spiral of depression and alcohol dependency, he appears emotionally disconnected from the world around him and burdened by an irreconcilable guilt for past mistakes.  Tommy Lee Jones's arresting portrayal of Robicheaux is far from sympathetic but the character fascinates us - a haunted solitary figure living on the edge of reason and acting like an avenging angel in a world that no longer has any moral sense.

With the connivance of his talented cinematographer Bruno de Keyzer, Tavernier conjures up an oppressive dreamlike experience that shows us the world as Robicheaux sees it: a rough nightmare reality in which danger and evil lurk in every corner, and where virtue is continually threatened, like a delicate blossom in a weed-infested garden.  As his mental condition deteriorates, Robicheaux loses the ability to distinguish real experiences from imaginary ones.  His conversations with a confederate general from the American Civil War are as real to him as his violent confrontations with local mobster Julius Balboni.  So heavily does Robicheaux's past impinge on his present that he can no longer tell them apart.  His real challenge is not the apprehension of a psychopathic killer, but the battle he must fight against himself as he strives to preserve his sanity and endow his lacklustre existence with some meaning. 

In his most unsettling film to date, Bertrand Tavernier sends us on an uncomfortable journey into some very dark places and prompts us to reflect on some deep moral issues.  As in his previous crime films, Le Juge et l'assassin (1976), Coup de torchon (1980) and L.627 (1992), we are left wondering whether there can ever be a place for ethical restraint in the fight against crime.  Should we feel safer in the knowledge that there are people like Dave Robicheaux to protect us, or should we be profoundly worried?  If lowly cops are permitted to play fast and loose with the law, what is to prevent others higher up in the legislative food chain from doing the same?  Before you know it, we might even have our elected leaders thinking they can get away with making up evidence to justify a totally pointless and unjustifiable war.  It's a slippery slope that leads to Hell...

Film Synopsis

In the Louisiana town of New Iberia, maverick cop Dave Robicheaux is on the trail of a serial killer whose victims are all vulnerable young women.  Shortly after visiting the scene of the latest brutal murder, Robicheaux runs into Elrod Sykes, a famous Hollywood actor who is making a film in the area, financed by the local crime boss Julius Balboni.  Sykes draws Robicheaux's attention to a decomposing body that he found in a swamp, the body of a black man in chains.  Robicheaux recalls an incident that he witnessed in his youth and becomes obsessed with uncovering the identity of the dead man and how he came to die.  As he does so, he comes ever closer to the serial killer, who poses a far greater threat than he imagines...