“Merci Docteur Rey” is a dark French-American comedy with voyeurism, murder, ransom, deception, narcissism, overbearing mothers, gay fathers, fate and Vanessa Redgrave. To describe the plot to this twisted film would be like dictating the Constitution in Spanish – it just wouldn’t make much sense.
“Merci Docteur Ray” follows three prominent characters that are all equally strange and fascinating.
Elisabeth Beaumont, played exceptionally by Dianne Wiest (“Edward Scissorhands”), is an opera diva to say the least. In the very first images of the film, we are taken to her home in Paris where the walls are filled with pictures, posters and acclaim – all of her. She eats chocolate-covered pickles, has conversations with herself, wears nightly beauty cream masks and cries for no reason.
She’s in a world where her idea of God is on a pedestal not much higher than her own. In the film, she hopes to rekindle her dying relationship with her son. She’s overbearing and disapproving of his lifestyle and relationships, although she hasn’t the first clue to what they are.
Thomas Beaumont (Stanislas Merhar), the protagonist of sorts, is a 23-year-old obsessed with personal ads placed over the phone. His mother, oblivious to anything other than herself, is still unaware that he is, in fact, gay. Thomas is a loner who bakes weed brownies and takes every opportunity for a bit of voyeurism. When one of his personal ads leads him to a man in his 40s offering him young love and 500 francs, Thomas obliges. What ensues is a situation right out of “Blue Velvet” or “Dressed to Kill” when the 40-year-old man is killed before Thomas’ eyes while he sits silently in the closet (pun intended).
When Thomas finds out that the man was actually his father, who he thought was dead for decades, Thomas continues to place personals to find his father’s killer.
When Thomas finds all of this out, he decides to go to a psychiatrist named Docteur Ruth Rey. Before he gets there, an eccentric patient (Jane Birkin), who thinks she’s Vanessa Redgrave and can’t work up the will power to put a putrid jar of mayonnaise back in her fridge, sits in on a session with the Docteur.
During the session, Docteur Rey has a heart attack and dies. When Thomas barges in, he has no idea what he’s about to get into.
The film is as sardonic and twisted as it is surprising and outrageous. With an equally diverse soundtrack from Cake’s “I will survive” to Sonny and Cher’s “I’ve got you babe” and divine opera, “Merci Docteur Rey” is the weirdest series of comedic events caught on film in recent years.
