Some Like it Rare [Barbaque] (2021) Review

Vincent Pascal (Fabrice Eboué) is a butcher in a small town whose business is failing. He prides himself on taking the most care he can in supplying the very best cuts of meat, lovingly prepared, to his dwindling clientele, but the masses are deserting his artisan approach in favour of cheaper, less considered options such as those offered by Vincent’s friend and more successful rival Marc Brachard (Jean-François Cayrey).

Thoroughly cheesed off with Vincent’s all-consuming focus on meat over marriage, wife Sophie (Marina Foïs) decides to call it a day on both their business and their romantic partnerships and that, coupled with an attack on his shop by a local vegan activist group, our friendly neighbourhood charcutier finds himself at this lowest ebb.

However, things take an unexpected turn when Vincent spots one of the vandals while out on drive and runs the miscreant over in a fit of pique. With no one around to witness the accident and an unwillingness to involve the police, Vincent utilises his skills to turn the body into something resembling the usual produce, intending to dump it as waste the next day.

Of course, you’ve guessed, Sophie mistakenly sticks the slab of prime human rib on the shelves and their favourite customer has already sampled it and deemed it delicious before Vincent can do anything about it. Before long, Vincent’s “Iranian pork” is the talk of the town and seems to be the perfect cash cow to save his livelihood and his marriage but how will he continue to supply his eager, ever growing line of customers? No vegan is safe…

With a set-up like this, subtlety is clearly not on the menu in this riotous, frequently hilarious, French comedy horror which constantly cuts close to the line of bad taste and strides over it confidently on more than a few occasions. Yet, for all of those moments which may seem unpalatable, it’s important to note that the overriding flavour is one of high farce – bolstered by a tasty black marinade – and that most of the characters populating the Rare universe are despicable in numerous ways.

In the lead role Eboué, who also directed and co-wrote the screenplay, concocts Vincent as the sort of boutique craftsman who is very much on the side of the independent supplier, talks about the evils of mass production and treats the produce with an over the top, extended ritual of massaging and caressing a cut of meat, yet proves to be as ruthless in his own way as Brachard, whose “pile it high, sell it cheap” methods and focus on building his franchise of butcher’s shops cause friction between the two.

Foïs is a dark delight too, her initially bored, frustrated spouse coming to life as she sees an opportunity to grab the comfortable lifestyle she sees Brachard’s wife Stéphanie (an excellent Virginie Hocq) enjoying, putting her hobby of watching serial killer documentaries to good use as she assumes the power behind the throne, guiding her hubby to racking up the folks in the freezer while keeping local gendarme Ntamack (a genial Stéphane Soo Mongo who is more interested in recipes than the ever growing numbers of missing persons) off their trail.

If you think the vegans are only on the hook in the back room of Vincent’s place, take a look at the origin of this piece and its country’s love of cuisines and all of the carnivorous tendencies attached thereby. The pro-plant folks do get the most sympathetic character in the entire film but the rest of them vary between addled, absolutely full of themselves or, in a couple of cases, far more psychotic than the reluctant – well, fairly reluctant – killer Vincent has become.

Chief amongst the predictably preachy set is Lucas (Victor Meutelet), the boyfriend of Vincent and Sophie’s daughter Chloé (Lisa Do Couto Texeira) who joins our meat-eating anti-heroes for dinner and, although Vincent assures all that there’s an open-mindedness in relation to the ongoing debate, becomes increasingly irritated and murderous as Lucas plonks himself firmly on his own righteous pedestal in a particularly amusing sequence.

Still, Lucas, for all of his posturing, is a saint at the side of Marc Brachard, given unpleasant life by a sleaze-infused performance from Cayrey which brings out the callous, racist, bigoted nature of a man motivated by materialism, shotguns and a total disregard for anyone who doesn’t share his skewed world view. You’ll want him to turn up on the chopping block the moment you meet him but ah, he’s not vegan, and that affects the quality of the meat, you see? Still, Vincent’s growing enmity for his nemesis means you never know if or when he’ll go off the (free) range for his next joint.

Some may find the bulk of Some Like It Rare genuinely offensive and that’s understandable. For me, the relentless ridiculousness of it all is what saves it. The brackish dialogue is key in lampooning these horrendous people and their petty prejudices and we’re invited to laugh at them rather than with them, all the time heaving a sigh of relief that we’re nothing like them, hopefully.

So, I’m making much of the comedy in this but what about the horror? Well, there’s an abundance of gore in this as limbs are chopped, blown off and minced in glorious colour and the up close and personal shots of regular customer Madame Coignard (Collette Sodoyez) chowing down on a taster of the thinly sliced “pork” might cause the odd gorge to rise at the very thought of where it’s come from but the over the top nature of the violence, plus a few judicious applied cutaways, means that it’s not an endurance test and a distant cousin to its more sobering, down and dirty French Extreme Cinema counterparts.

If there is a slight issue with Some Like It Rare it’s that the jokes come so thick and fast in the first half that there’s a slight lull when the story has to address the potential consequences of Vincent’s killing spree but matters soon get back on track with a laugh-out loud montage involving a wildlife documentary and a conclusion which may not assuage everyone’s craving for comeuppance but shouldn’t provoke you to have it returned to the kitchen and ask for your bill reduced accordingly.

Perhaps the satire isn’t quite as pointed as it could be but Some Like It Rare’s prime objective is to go for the funny bone and it still manages to raise various issues concerning French society without having to go full Vincent about them and hit you with a cleaver. There’s a side order of messages if you want the full dining experience but if you’re just there to enjoy three courses of a twisted, crazy gorefest served up with several big laughs then tuck in, there’s plenty to satisfy.

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