As a lover of literature and French style, I was naturally ecstatic to catch a screening of this in a post-lockdown setting. The film kept my intrique through its whole runtime. The mystery, detective drama of it all was done beautifully, and seeped in melancholy, to which I presumed would keep itself during the end reveal.

After I walked out of the empty theatre, I felt disappointed because of the opportunity that was missed. The final reveal of who Henri Pick really was... was just some guy, who had, up to that point, a total of 20 minutes of screentime at best. An even bigger blow was that he revealed that he went to a tombstone and stole the name of a real man named Henri Pick, and meticulously set up a scheme for his girlfriend to find: a randomly placed red manuscript in the library of rejected manuscripts. Presumably, his cause was to achieve fame after getting snubbed for success from his last novel. What a prick.

Eesh. The let-down slumped me in my seat. What they could've done was this perhaps: have the whole investigation lead up to the melancholic and affirming reveal that Henri Pick, and everything about his book, was in fact real. This would be such an emotional posterity for the detective/critic, as during the closing, say half an hour, the investigation starts to gradually reveal itself into hints of truth and the detective begins to lose track and hope. During the closing minutes the audience could already sense what could be revealed, and the detective could affirm this with a statement of "It was real", etc, and induces a somber and reflective moment, as the film ends.

But, alas, here's what we got. 6/10

The storyline idea is original but the film rambles on too long to keep the attention of the viewer.

Certain outcomes are obvious but the ending is unexpected albeit a bit long winded.

Agatha Christie need not worry.

"Let's see a movie" we said one night. An intriguing plot ("a masterpiece that no one knows its author") led us to this movie. I generally enjoy french films and the length of it (1h36m) was certainly a plus. The film starts out very nice: an unknown writer, who has just published his first unsuccessful book, hears the very interesting story of a library specifically for unsuccessful and unpublished books. His girlfriend, a publisher, visits it and discovers a book that she adores and believes must be published. She does, making famous a random man, former owner of a pizza place and dead for the past three years, and subsequently his family (daughter and wife). A book critic, intrigued by the background of this said "genius", suspects something fishy and decides to uncover the truth. So far so good. This is the first 30 minutes of the movie and the good part for me. The next part is the journey towards the discovery: an utterly boring journey, with the building of a forced love story, between two characters with absolutely no chemistry, because why not. We discover multiple, shallow characters who try to be funny, mysterious and/or angry with the motive of the critic and his research. At one point, before the big break, the co-star actually suggest to stop there and oh, how I wish they would. Because what comes next ruins the whole movie: what's the logic behind publishing a book under a random, unknown person's name, when you yourself are unknown in the first place? I got the "I-did-it-to-win-you-over" game (the "framing" as she puts it), but the rest no, I don't see the good in it.

One thing I truly loved: the book critic, as he was in the beginning: cynical and always speaking his mind, without fear. His lines were the only funny parts in the movie. Of course he becomes a bit lovey-dovey and soppy towards the end, but I forgive him for being the only interesting character in this promising but after all disappointing film.