Photo: Phillippe Falardeau's Congorama
While the title inaccurately conjures up images of a stomach-churning ride on the less-puked side of a traveling carnival midway, Congorama's surfeit of plot twists and implausible coincidences strain narrative credibility even as the remarkably brawny presentation from writer-director Phillippe Falardeau provides a warm rush. In the film, the psycho-racial-familial-vocational identity crises of Michel Roy (Olivier Gourmet) all come to a head as his failed attempts to live up to his now-enfeebled father's high reputation as a famous Belgian writer are reaching a rapidly approaching end; his cachet as renowned offspring can't offset the fact that he can't seem to throw together a decent enough pitch worthy of scoring the all-important patent. This happens as his undeserved marriage to a patient and loving Congolese woman endures the deepening strain of his passive suspicions over the true paternity of the black son she swears belongs to him. Eric Henderson
While the title inaccurately conjures up images of a stomach-churning ride on the less-puked side of a traveling carnival midway, Congorama's surfeit of plot twists and implausible coincidences strain narrative credibility even as the remarkably brawny presentation from writer-director Phillippe Falardeau provides a warm rush. In the film, the psycho-racial-familial-vocational identity crises of Michel Roy (Olivier Gourmet) all come to a head as his failed attempts to live up to his now-enfeebled father's high reputation as a famous Belgian writer are reaching a rapidly approaching end; his cachet as renowned offspring can't offset the fact that he can't seem to throw together a decent enough pitch worthy of scoring the all-important patent. This happens as his undeserved marriage to a patient and loving Congolese woman endures the deepening strain of his passive suspicions over the true paternity of the black son she swears belongs to him. Eric Henderson
