Polygraphe, Le

Alternative title: Polygraph Lie Detector, The
Synopsis: Feature film based on the play by Lepage and Brassard and described by the author as a ‘metaphysical detective story’. The story revolves around the unsolved murder of a woman several years previously. A young waiter, François, who discovers a body is accused of the crime and takes a polygraph (lie detector) test which proves his innocence. However, he is not told of the result. Later, actress Lucie, who has been starring as Hamlet in an unorthodox French production of the play, successfully auditions for a film role - as the murder victim. Her reactions to the murder are contrasted with those of François and the criminologist who couldn’t find the killer.
Language: French (Canada)
Country: Canada; Germany; Netherlands
Medium: Film
Technical information: Colour / Sound
Year of release: 1994
Duration: 92 mins
Availability: No archive copy or distributor found (11/2007)

Director

Robert Lepage

Producer

Bruno Jobin

Cinematographer

Guy Dufaux

Writer

Music

Pierre Marchand; Robert Caux

Costume

Luc J. Beland

Art Direction

Monique Dion

Cast

Marie Brassard	Lucy
Patrick Goyette	Francois

History: Released in the UK January 1999
Reviews: `Structurally, we are presented with a film-and-play-within-a-play. Lucie acts the part of the murdered woman for the exploitational film version of the ‘real’ story in which she, her neighbour François, and her lover David are, in their lives, still inextricably bound up. She is also involved, as an actress, in another murder plot, playing the title role in a stage production of Hamlet. Does the theatrical art approach truth any more closely than the cinematic? Is Yorick’s prop skull any less a contrivance than the movie’s fake tear or the three takes of Lucie’s nude death scene?' [from Wasserman, Jerry. Modern Canadian Plays: Third Edition Vol. 2 :294).