Le trip a trois by Benoit Pelletier - Nine out of 10

Le trip a trois by Benoit Pelletier

Nine out of 10

It seems quite unfair to see that this amusing, intriguing, fresh comedy is destined to voyage through obscurity, apart from the airing on some of the HBO channels, where this cinephile could watch it yesterday, on Cinemax 1 or 2, while Marriage Story or Dolomite is My Name sail to the Golden Globes ceremony, where the former has the most nominations, six, including for Best Film, Actor and Actress, Screenplay.

This is not to say that Marriage Story is without merit, but it appears that there is little, if any difference between the two motion pictures, in terms of performances, in fact, if anything, perhaps Melissa Desormeaux-Poulin as Estelle Legrand and Martin Matte as Simon Monette might have shined more than Scarlett Johansson and Adam Driver, in what may be more challenging roles, at least from the perspective – biased as it probably is, for if one does not expect outlandish representations form an average movie, audiences expect more from an acclaimed, multi nominated feature – of the under signed.

Estelle Legrand aka Melissa Desormeaux-Poulin is 34 when she starts feeling – well that was wrong, for she had been in this quandary for some time – that the clichés, regular life, the déjà vu of every day are bearing on her – in fact, Stefan Klein in his magnificent Rules of Happiness explains that one of the quintessential paradigms of wellbeing is change, diversity.

Therefore, the protagonist is first aware that her sexual life is tedious – in one scene, early on, she has coitus with Simon and she keeps telling him not to finish – surely because she must be still away from her orgasm – but the partner is off in matter of minutes, maybe seconds, lies on the bed and then pats the woman on the back, in what looks like a condescending, maybe futile gesture.

Estelle talks to her friends, finds encouragement to explore…one of the girlfriends is very audacious, she keeps suggesting that men want their partners to be rather slutty, she exemplifies at one moment by approaching a stranger that she had thought remarked her, looked at her mouth insistently – at least in the mind of the woman – but when she walked to the man, his date arrived.

In a bar, the heroine is kissed by a stranger, a woman that takes this as a challenge, then she thinks of exploring beyond the limits with Simon, telling him to tie her up for a bondage, BDSM session, but when she thinks she has had enough, the man would not budge…in another instance, she uses handcuffs in the toilet, at the office, while the female boss is outside waiting, and both keys to liberation are broken and hence, she has to have a colleague release her with a saw.

While they think about exploring Le trip a trois, which stands for a threesome, ménage a trois – if a brief, one night stand one – their child hears them and furthermore, when they are asked on some issue at school, the boy – I can’t remember if it was a boy or a girl – comes upfront and tries to talk about Le trip a trois, only to be interrupted by the teacher, who, looks like she is actually interested in the idea, although not to be discussed with the very small children, but to engage with the parents…

Another amusing chapter is the one in which various potential lovers audition, one suffers from a hearing impediment and has her thoughts and desires translated by a man, who, when asked states that he would come along, to watch, for he comes everywhere the woman goes…another woman, potential sexual partner talks about the $ 500 that it would take to bed her…