There are about three movies in Eat The Night , the overstretched queer gangland romantic thriller by directors Jonathan Vinel and Caroline Poggi, much admired for their edgy sci-fi fantasy Jessica Forever , which played at Tiff and Berlin.
And none of them are particularly good. Eat The Night frustratingly switches tones, underwrites many of its characters and adds more threads than it can possibly tie together. Yet Vinel and Poggi inelegantly blend the gaming components with real-world travails, while also relying on predictable plotting. In the span of a few minutes we understand that Pablo and Apolline have been estranged from their father for some time. Pablo is a loving, quick-trigger type who, through his illicit drug sales — which appear to be pretty small-time—is somehow supporting the siblings.
That could be by design. After all, she is wholly dedicated to the escapism of a digital world. What exactly is she going to do once it all goes dark? A similar thinness affects Night, too. Pablo soon talks Night into quitting his service job and moving out to a country shack, where they begin manufacturing their own drugs to sell on the street.
Night dutifully follows Pablo; the pair get into club fights which mark both men out as targets for a gang with its own unnecessary backstory. We learn frustratingly little about Night, apart from him having a sister and a niece.
Night is an updated trope of the hyper-sexualized exotic Black body. You can see his fate from a mile away. Eat The Night frantically switches between Apolline stubbornly sitting home alone and sensual scenes between Pablo and Night.
