Rating of
3/4
"Angel-A" by Yojimbo
Yojimbo - wrote on 03/02/12
When a downtrodden small timer tries to kill himself when faced with insurmountable debts, he meets his guardian angel in the form of a statuesque beauty. Beautifully photographed in and around Paris, Angel-A sees Luc Besson returning to the familiar territory of French cinema in which beautiful but insane women always seem to fall for ugly French wasters! Rie Rasmussen's picture is probably filed under the word "goddess" in Wikipedia, and she shows some great talent for comedy with her character who is a cross between Clarence from It's A Wonderful Life and the ghost of Christmas present from Scrooged. Her "alternative" strategies when it comes to dealing with a suitably down at heel Jamel Debbouze's problems makes for some nice laughs and it has an easy and pleasant charm that is all too often missing from its schmaltz infested American counterparts. The plot is intriguing until the end, where it unfortunately falls down with an easy but unsatisfying resolution to supply the (decidedly un-French) happy ending, but it is still an engaging if lightweight little fantasy.
