Two weeks ago I published my compilation of the best world series unreleased in our country in 2022 and if you are attentive followers of the blog, you will remember that the first position in that list was for the Quebec series ‘La nuit où Laurier Gaudreault s ‘est réveille ‘ Montreal’s revered young filmmaker Xavier Dolan’s first foray into television.
Having come out at the end of the year, I hadn’t had the material time to be able to do a complete review, so I decided to take advantage of this first entry from the Remote Mondays of 2023 to analyze this fantastic miniseries in the way it deserves.
Token: The Night Laurier Gaudreault Woke Up (Quebec, Canada) 5 ep 60m Nov 2022- . Tongue: French Rope: Club Illico (CAN) / Unreleased in Spain
The plot:
In Val-de-Chutes, a small rural town in Quebec, the Larouche family is in a state of decomposition due to a very serious trauma that occurred thirty years ago that neither the mother nor the four children have managed to overcome in three decades. . A recent family tragedy has brought back those traumas with unpredictable consequences and which have a lot to do with the title of the miniseries which we can translate as ‘The night Laurier Gaudreault woke up’.
The story develops on two main lines, that of the last thirty years ago in which the character Laurier Gaudreault has a leading role, while in the current one the trigger is the dying state of the matriarch of the Larouche family who she tried to keep attached to his family torn apart over the past thirty years.
The central axis of each episode is perfectly described by the title, which always begins with ‘The night…’ and which provides us with the keys to each chapter.
Xavier Dolan adapted a play of the same name written by Michel Marc Bouchard and which was very successful in its representation in Montreal, to the point that he chose many of the actors from the play for his audiovisual adaptation due to their great relationship with its theatrical characters, in particular the protagonist Julie Le Breton, who plays Mireille Larouche, the only daughter of the family and who presents herself with the following disturbing video.
The Larouche family is a veritable chrome starting with the matriarch Madeleine (Anne Dorval, Xavier Dolan’s fetish actress), who controlled as best she could a family in crisis, especially her daughter Mireille (Julie Le Breton), distant embalmer of her city for many years and who runs away from reality with a rather uncontrolled nymphomania.
His three brothers continued to live in Val-de-Chutes, but with rather miserable lives, starting with Julien (Patrick Hivon), trapped in a marriage he hates and continuing with Denis, overwhelmed by his recent divorce and separation of his two daughters whom he adores Finally we have Benjamin Elliot, played by Xavier Dolan himself (photo), a true human wreck, completely self-destructed by the indiscriminate use of drugs and alcohol.
This gloomy initial panorama only makes things worse when we learn about the events of the past that have marked his entire existence with that Laurier Gaudreault character, hovering over all the family events, but as if the mere mention of it were a taboo.
I must admit that I have not seen any of Xavier Dolan’s films, so I arrived with no prior knowledge of his narrative style and was very surprised by the intense tone of this family melodrama, with an overall story full of surprises and great revelations. .. perfectly dosed during the few five episodes it lasts, with a perfect closure.
Its premiere aroused absolute madness among all Quebec television critics, which in my case I can only confirm while waiting for some platform to want to add some luster to its catalog with this great claim for professional viewers which is the name of Xavier Dolan.
Finally, I leave you with the trailer of its premiere on the modest platform of the Quebec Club Illico, which has gradually gained a certain prestige thanks to series like this one or “Blue Moon”.
We await your opinions and comments, here or on our twitter account (@lmejino). Until the next time
Lorenzo Mejino
