Writer and director Rudolphe Lauga’s new action thriller, Ad Vitam, arrived on Netflix, and couldn’t have come at a better time in signaling action fans that the French corner of the genre is here to stay. Lauga also penned the script with David Corona, and leading man Guillaume Canet who is joined on screen by Stéphane Caillard, and break-out Mayhem! star Nassim Lyes who is also enjoying a run on the platform in Xavier Gens’s shark thriller, Under Paris.
Ad Vitam is a twisty and compelling thriller that remains ever propulsive in its unraveling of events surrounding Franck, a former member of the elite GIGN tactical police unit whose life falls into disarray when a bungled mission snowballs into an aftermath of consequences that now endanger his post-retirement life of marriage and fatherhood with loving wife and former cop, Leo. Lyes partakes in a supporting capacity as Benjamin, one of the GIGN’s latest additions in a timeline that flashes back in the first half of the film to showcase much of the film’s crucial backstory to help connect the dots a little more as the film progresses.
This is especially good since the film is quick to establish that Franck and Leo are already in some kind of danger. What we don’t know right away is from who, and that’s until a gang of armed men break into Franck and Leo’s home in search of an article of missing evidence connected to a violent incident that gets illustrated later in the film. It’s not long until a pregnant Leo gets kidnapped by the same goons who decide to plant Franck’s finger prints on a gun, and it all happens amid the film’s intense and sprightly pacing, even during some of the more relaxed moments.
Lauga’s biggest strength here is the action, where even Caillard’s role gets in on the action, guns blazing, fisticuffs and all. A good deal of the film’s stunt heavy acts are either from wire suspension, or on the jagged rooftops where Franck can execute his nimble footwork when he’s being hunted by the police and needs to get out of a jam. The big climatic scene in the final leg of the film finds Benjamin wounded as he hits the gas to race Leo to the hospital when she falls into labor, and our hero races to the finish using a Paramotor Backpack to protect his friends.
I did find some of the writing and positioning of a few characters a little odd, but it’s a nitpick that doesn’t really get in the way of the film’s enjoyment. Lauga clearly understood the assignment with Ad Vitam, which is all that action fans can really ask for.
Watch Ad Vitam on Netflix.
