The Empire (2024) Kino Lorber Blu-ray Review

Plot:

The fate of the cosmos centers around a small French village where a savior child is born.

Review:

A quaint village in Northern France is actually the hub of extraterrestrial interest between two types of people: The Ones and the Zeroes. If I understand it correctly (and this is one seriously wacky movie, so forgive me if I misunderstood it), the Ones are the aliens, governed by a zany emperor (Fabrice Luchini) who governs from a throne room in deep space where he ogles the massive derrières of his court jesters, gleefully deciding the fate of human kind with a twirl of his whim. The Zeroes are lowly humans, but when a blonde-haired cherub child is born in this particular village, he’s apparently the harbinger of a new era of mankind, and apparently that’s bad for the Ones. The child is born unto a bit of a dweeby looking young man named Jony (first time actor Brandon Vileghe who must’ve had one hell of a time working on this movie because his character gets laid a lot with some incredible looking women), and Jony is somewhat aware that his son is special. He has lots of interest in the local beauties in the village, including the possibly human, possibly One trendy chick Line (Lyna Khoudri), who seems a little “off” all the time, possibly because she’s sort of a conduit between the Ones and the Zeroes. Then, there is the cosmic knight Jane (the stunningly beautiful Anamaria Vartolomei), who is working for the opposing force of the Ones, but she falls hard in lust and love with Jony and refuses to kill him because he turns out to be a great lay in the hay. Her sidekick is a weird looking cosmic knight named Rudy (Julien Manier) who struggles with wielding his triple-sword lightsaber weapon. When it comes down to it, a black hole opens up in the sky and the war between the Ones and Zeroes is fought and decided in just a few moments, leaving the village befuddled by the strange things that have been going on.

I don’t really know what to make of this bizarre film. It kind of reminded me of a big budget Jim Jarmusch film with its deadpan delivery and ho-hum approach, but it’s got lots of impressive visual effects, and honestly the actresses in it are drop dead gorgeous and made the movie worth watching. The film has a weird stance on sex with its frank unflinching (but somewhat tasteful) erotic scenes, but the film is just so confoundingly weird that it’s almost like a Humanoids comic book come to life, but less engrossing. Fans of Moebius and Jodorowsky might enjoy it more than others. From director Bruno Dumont.

Kino Lorber has just released a DVD and a Blu-ray edition of The Empire, and they’re affordably priced to own. There are no special features included.