Holy Motors
| Holy Motors | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Leos Carax |
| Produced by |
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| Written by | Leos Carax |
| Starring | |
| Cinematography |
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| Edited by | Nelly Quettier |
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Production
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| Distributed by | Les Films du Losange |
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Release date
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Running time
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116 minutes |
| Country |
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| Language | French English Chinese |
| Budget | $4 million |
| Box office | $4.2 million |
Holy Motors is a 2012 French-German fantasy drama film written and directed by Leos Carax, starring Denis Lavant and Édith Scob. Lavant plays Mr. Oscar, a man not unlike an actor who inhabits several roles, but there are no apparent cameras filming the man's performances. It is Carax's first feature film since 1999. The film competed for the Palme d'Or at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival.
After waking up one morning, a man called "The Sleeper" locates and opens a secret door in his apartment. He enters, wandering into a packed movie house, while a young child and a giant dog wander up and down the aisles.
Meanwhile, a man called Oscar rides to work in a white limousine, driven by his close friend and associate Céline. Oscar's job involves using makeup, elaborate costumes and props to carry out a number of complex and unusual "appointments", sometimes for the service of others, and at other times for seemingly no reason at all. The rest of the film is set in Paris. At his first appointment, Oscar masquerades as an old woman beggar in the street. At the next, Oscar wears a motion capture suit and performs an action sequence and simulated sex with an actress on a soundstage while being directed by an unseen man. At Oscar's third appointment, he plays the role of Monsieur Merde, an eccentric and violent red-haired man who kidnaps a beautiful model from her photo-shoot in a cemetery. The next scene finds Oscar as a father picking up his daughter from a party in an old red car. The two argue when the daughter reveals that she had spent the party crying in the bathroom instead of socializing. Céline continues to drive Oscar to his appointments.
In a little interlude, Oscar performs a short musical piece on accordion with a group of other musicians in a church. In the fifth scene he assumes the role of a Chinese gangster assigned to murder a man who looks identical to him. After he has stabbed the man in the neck and carved scars into his face that match his own, the victim suddenly stabs the gangster in the neck as well. Oscar manages to limp his way back to the limousine, seemingly injured before being seen sitting comfortably inside the limo removing his makeup. A man with a port-wine stain on one side of his face is sitting in the limo and discusses Oscar's work with him, informing Oscar that others believe he is getting "tired". Oscar admits that his business is changing, and that he misses the days when he was aware of cameras. He remains in his profession, though, for "the beauty of the act". Later, in what turns out to be the sixth sequence, Oscar abruptly runs from the limo, dons a balaclava, and shoots a banker (who looks identical to Oscar when he left for his first appointment in the morning) eating at a cafe before he is gunned down by the banker's bodyguards. Céline rushes to him, urging him towards his next appointment, and again Oscar returns to the limo unharmed.
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