Boomerang (2015) Review

Lucas Versantvoort / 13 Nov 2015

Every once in a while, you see a drama that is so well-intentioned, but so...'normal' (for lack of a better word) that you're left unable to decide whether it was bad or good. Boomerang is one of those films.

The story mainly revolves around Antoine's unhealthy obsession with what he perceives to be a mystery regarding the death of his mother. Whenever he asks about it, he's given the silent treatment. His sister, Agathe, has her own daily life problems and quickly gets sick of Antoine always hammering on about little details that just don't add up. Nevertheless, as Antoine keeps digging, he finds answers and more questions. This results in a film about the long-term harm family secrets can cause. 

The basic problem with Boomerang (besides the painfully symbolic title) is that it's really hard to care about these characters, particularly the main character. Antoine is immediately suspicious about the perceived silence on his mother's death. We don't get to see him slowly become suspicious, so we can share his anxieties. The result is that, instead of rooting for Antoine, we tend to agree with Agathe and others who want him to stop whining. I mean, get this: early in the film, Antoine crashes his car, out of anger or some subconscious desire to re-enact the death of his mother (which also involved a car), causing Agathe to be hospitalized. The next day, Antoine's whining to someone about how he doesn't understand Agathe's reticence to talk about their mother's death and his suspicions! This is our protagonist, ladies and gentlemen. The only character I liked was the biker chick who's tragic past shared some similarities with Antoine's, so it was nice to see these two troubled souls getting together.

But yeah, every problem Boomerang has can be traced back to its dreadful first act. Here, the film should have made us root for Antoine, but it doesn't, which causes us to lose interest in the mystery. A mystery by the way, that doesn't turn out to be as interesting as I hoped. It's predictable in that, you already know it couldn't have been a murder due to the film's overall feel, so there's only one other option: social scandal. The film is obviously well-intentioned and its themes of transgenerational family secrets and the grief enforced silences can cause come through loud and clear, but the film doesn't render these themes in an emotionally fulfilling fashion.