Just minutes to Quentin Dupieux’s smoking causes coughA group of five superheroes, known as the Tobacco Force, destroy a giant rubber band by shooting it with a concentrated stream of cigarette smoke. tortoise monsters. Soaked in the greasy blood and guts of the monster, Tobacco Force celebrates victory once again. It looks like you’re in the office like it’s another day. In this case, an empty quarry is the ideal filming location for spandex-clad kung fu antics and explosions.
The five members of Tobacco Force are named after the elements of cigarette smoke: benzene, nicotine, ammonia, mercury and methanol. He turns out to be a mouse-like puppet that looks like it burned to ash after a cigarette was left, and is always dripping green slime. Dressed-up comedy suddenly became terrifyingly obvious. I have an unrequited love.
It only gets weirder from there.
smoking causes cough Masked as a superhero show transmission Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Kamen Rider, Monsters of the Week, villains and looming intergalactic threats. When Mercury is unsure of his performance and unable to smoke when needed, Chief his Didier orders recovery time for the entire team. A forced joyous retreat is needed to deal with the cohesion of their struggling groups before a potentially catastrophic event, Chief says.
Dupieux establishes a wonderfully bizarre, microscale world-building as a retreat. Arriving at the bunker away from home, his members of the team express their joy at seeing the lake. They marvel at amenities like saltwater showers, hard titanium beds, and refrigerators that are just the gateway to a well-stocked grocery store. They sleep in full Tobacco Army costumes and go swimming.
What happens next is when members of the Tobacco Army grapple with personal issues and try to connect by telling each other weird stories. But Dupieux fills his 80-minute short film with silly tunes.It’s impossible to predict what will happen next smoking causes coughBecause Dupieux rejects the superhero storytelling template in favor of whiplash-inducing story choices.
The stories Dupuy tells through his characters are ludicrous, ridiculous, and violent.Writer and director — best known for his 2010 film rubberabout a owned murderous rubber car tire—provides shocking violence and gore, but has the most laid-back, subdued direction. One of the moments is delivered with such amazing nonchalance that it makes the whole thing. smoking causes cough Worth seeing.
In the film’s production notes, Dupuy said his superhero film “never imposes pretentious speech and has no narrative moral”, and that it is simply a “shameless source of insignificant entertainment”. It’s certainly true — this is a low-key hangout movie with very minimal stakes and no big resolution. Stick with the later scene.)
at the same time, smoking causes cough‘s lightness and immorality are hard to match with themes of environmental decay, pollution, and social disconnection. Indeed, his films at first seem like nostalgic superhero farce. Then it starts feeling like a prank on the audience. But the more you dig into it, the less true it becomes.
At one point, when Tobacco Force leader Benzene told the team’s starry-eyed fans that smoking was an unhealthy habit that destroyed his body and didn’t make him look cool, Dupuy sent a moral message. But when faced with impending destruction, our hero nervously ends his chain-smoking while reflecting on life’s absurdity and missed opportunities. smoking causes coughLife is short, illogical, and often feels like a big joke one beat off the punch line.
smoking causes cough now playing with limited theatrical releasecan be rented or purchased at Amazon, buduand other digital platforms.