''Red Eyes'' () is a Canadian thriller drama film, directed by

Yves Simoneau Yves Simoneau (; born October 28, 1955) is a Canadian film and television director. Simoneau was born in Quebec City, Quebec. Recognition His acclaimed 1986 crime drama '' Intimate Power (Pouvoir intime)'' garnered multiple Genie Awards nominat ...

and released in 1982.

Gerald Pratley Gerald Arthur Pratley (September 3, 1923 – March 14, 2011) was a Canadian film critic and historian. Piers Handling"Gerald Arthur Pratley" ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'', September 18, 2011. A longtime film critic for the Canadian Broadcasting Cor ...

, ''A Century of Canadian Cinema''. Lynx Images, 2003. . p. 180. The film is a dramatization of the "automne chaud", a real-life series of voyeurism and sexual assault incidents in

Quebec City Quebec City is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the Census Metropolitan Area (including surrounding communities) had a populati ...

in 1979 that culminated in the murder of young actress France Lachapelle. The film stars

Marie Tifo Marie Tifo (; born September 26, 1949, in Jonquière, Quebec) is a Canadian actress, and a major star in French-speaking Canada. She won a Genie Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for her performance in the 1980 drama f ...

as Marie-Louise, the film's version of Lachapelle, as well as Jean-Marie Lemieux,

Pierre Curzi Pierre Curzi (born February 11, 1946, in Montreal, Quebec) is an actor, screenwriter and politician in Quebec. He is a former Member of the National Assembly of Quebec (MNA) for the riding of Borduas in the Montérégie region south of Montrea ...

Raymond Bouchard Raymond Bouchard (born March 7, 1945, in Lauzon, Quebec) is a Canadian film, television and stage actor. He is most noted for his performances in the film '' Seducing Doctor Lewis (La Grande séduction)'', for which he received Genie Award and P ...

, Denise Proulx,

Pierrette Robitaille Pierrette Robitaille C.M. (born June 6, 1950) is a Canadian film and television actress from Quebec. Career Robitaille is a two-time Genie Award nominee for Best Actress, for her role as Mme Therrien in '' It's Your Turn, Laura Cadieux (C't'à ...

Rémy Girard Rémy Girard (born August 10, 1950) is a Canadian actor and former television host from Quebec.Gaetan Charlebois"Girard, Rémy" ''Canadian Theatre Encyclopedia'', December 5, 2023. Early life Born in Jonquière, he is the son of politician Fern ...

, Gaston Lepage, Micheline Bernard, Denise Gagnon,

Paul Hébert Paul Hébert, OC, CQ (May 28, 1924 – April 20, 2017) was a French Canadian television and stage actor and director, and the founder of six theatres in Quebec. He is best known for his role as Siméon Desrosiers in '' Le Temps d’une paix'', ...

, Serge Thibodeau, Bob Walsh and Yves Bourque.

Critical response

Alexandre Fontaine Rousseau of ''Panorama Cinema'' called the film a "second-rate

giallo In Italian cinema, (; : ; from , ) is a genre that often contains Slasher film, slasher, thriller (genre), thriller, psychological horror, psychological thriller, Sexploitation film, sexploitation, and, less frequently, supernatural, supernat ...

", and opined that elements of it seemed copied from '' Black Christmas'' and the films of

Dario Argento Dario Argento (; born 7 September 1940) is an Italian film director, screenwriter and producer. His influential work in the horror film, horror and giallo genres during the 1970s and 1980s has led him to being referred to as the "Master of the ...

. For the ''

Montreal Gazette ''The Gazette'', also known as the ''Montreal Gazette'', is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper which is owned by Postmedia Network. It is published in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the only English-language daily newspape ...

'', Maureen Peterson gave it a mixed review, praising its camera work and acting but assessing the film as "caught between two perfectly valid objectives. Is it a thriller designed primarily to entertain, or a cinematic essay on violence and sexism?"

Legacy

Lachapelle had been a friend and colleague of actor and filmmaker

Robert Lepage Robert Lepage (born December 12, 1957) is a Canadian playwright, actor, film director, and stage director. Early life Lepage was raised in Quebec City. At age five, he was diagnosed with a rare form of alopecia, which caused complete hair lo ...

in the Quebec City theatre scene, with the result that Lepage was the last person to see her alive and was actually the police investigator's initial suspect before being cleared, yet Simoneau asked Lepage to play the killer in ''Red Eyes''.David Lawrence Pike, ''Canadian Cinema Since the 1980s: At the Heart of the World''.

University of Toronto Press The University of Toronto Press is a Canadian university press. Although it was founded in 1901, the press did not actually publish any books until 1911. The press originally printed only examination books and the university calendar. Its first s ...

, 2012. . p, 166. This inspired Lepage's 1996 film ''

Polygraph A polygraph, often incorrectly referred to as a lie detector test, is a pseudoscientific device or procedure that measures and records several physiological indicators such as blood pressure, pulse, respiration, and skin conductivity while a ...

(Le Polygraphe)'', which centred on an actress who was cast as the victim in a film about a murder despite having personally known both the victim and the primary suspect.Gary Michael Dault, "Robert Lepage's Le Confessionnal & Le Polygraphe". '' Take One'', Spring 1997.

References

External links

* 1982 films 1982 crime thriller films Canadian crime thriller films French-language Canadian films 1980s Canadian films Films directed by Yves Simoneau Films shot in Quebec City {{1980s-Canada-film-stub