1991 ‘Toto le héros’ Directed by Jaco Van Dormael
80-year-old Thomas recounts his childhood and middle age through a series of flashbacks and dream sequences. Thomas believes he’s been taken away from a better life at birth; following a hospital fire, he vividly recalls being swapped with another new-born, and subsequently grows up in a poorer neighbouring household.
托托小英雄, Toto el héroe, 토토의 천국, Toto der Held, Toto le héros - Un eroe di fine millennio, Totos meritter, Toto bohater, Totó, o Herói
What an exercise in sheer delight this film is, a film that captures the essence of childhood memories, whimsy, love, jealousy, obsession amongst it's many other delights and treasures. Jaco Van Dormael has only made three films in a 20+ year career and with his debut Toto the Hero, he shows talent that most film-makes could only hope to aspire to.
The film begins with an elderly man who believes he was switched at birth with his next door neighbour, and through a complex web of flashbacks, flights of fantasy and multiple time-lines, weaves through life story in ultimate plot to kill the person who 'stole his life'. Due to the fact that our narrator is one of unreliable nature,…
An old man reminisces about tragic episodes of his childhood and events of his adult life, determined to execute a plan to finally take revenge on the life he believes has been taken away from him. Toto le héros is a film about memories, obsessions, nostalgia for the past and what never was, about the resentment that grows over the years, and the lingering sense of feeling like a perennial outsider in the world. Jaco Van Dormael's debut is a rather peculiar work, intense at times, with a good balance of drama and humour; a reminder for everyone to enjoy the present instead of wasting time longing for what others have and daydreaming, otherwise life will pass us by and that lost time will never come back.
I was looking forward to catching Jaco Van Dormael's first film after enjoying his most known (Mr Nobody) eons ago.
The title seems to suggest this is some friendly child's picture. If you like tones of incest and children setting houses on fire in your children's story, then this flick is indeed for you!
An old man has a capital V for vendetta against another old man for "stealing" his life (they swapped families as infants).
It's not that he was without pity, but he was contemptible in his self-pity. Add to that an ending I found more offensive than not.
Toto the Hero is out to prove there can be such a thing as too much whimsy.
I can…
Um Homem Com Duas Vidas estreava ha´30 anos no Festival de Cannes.
Ressentiment is a hell of a drug. Nem dá para dizer que os atos do protagonista são um eterno retorno do recalcado porque ele não parece represar nada dos sentimentos mais mesquinhos que o aflige, nem os desejos incestuosos pela irmão, mesmo tendo se imposto um tabu alí. Essas reminiscências não parecem fazê-lo elaborar suas neuroses, só a potencializam e o tornam cada vez mais ressentido, nesse caso talvez ele tenha encontrado a melhor solução mesmo.
Plus: Fica bem claro o porquê o Terry Gilliam ama esse filme, tem tudo a ver com ele.
BlurayRip NOGRP.
Added to: Jaco van Dormael Ranked
Toto the Hero, Belgian Jaco van Dormael's first feature film in a small oeuvre of lauded, little tales, is at least as extravagant as these later works. In this, he lets a lifetime of grief and envy play out in an old man's memories yet presents them through the eye's of a child: disjointed, chaotic yet always highly playful, not quite unlike the cinema of Jean-Pierre Jeunet.
Stuck in a retiring home the aging Toto (short for Thomas) remembers his life and all the misfortune that befell him. In a lurid opening sequence he tells of how, during a fire in the hospital, the nurses mistook him for his neighbor and delivered the babies…
Sparks of Vertigo and Tarkovsky's The Mirror, this little gem is proof that good things do come in small packages.
very whimsical and amusing on its own. loved how little glimpses from here are still incarnated in Dormael’s later films.
Like Until the End of the World, this was another formative film of mine from the 90s that I thought I might never see again, until I discovered that Arrow Academy had released a special edition Blu-ray.
What gets me the most now, is how well Van Dormael captures the obsessions that Thomas still has as an old man and what fuels his desire to kill Alfred, and how he builds it up using its non-linear narrative, bouncing back and forth in time, and also between memories and fantasies. It's also his pain of memories that Van Dormael shows so well on screen, which I can connect to better now that I am getting older myself.
There are too many…
An alternately whimsical and bittersweet debut from Jaco Van Dormael, Toto the Hero tells a heart-warming mediation on family, class and identity with a non-linear narrative, stunning visuals and brilliant performances from Michel Bouquet, Jo De Backer and Thomas Godet as Thomas in three stages of his life.
Matilda x Jojo's Bizarre Adventure x Twin Peaks.
Definitely some... questionable relationship dynamics (won't spoil), but a fun, twisted, playfully suspenseful flick for a night in.
Recommended viewing: Burrito-ed on a couch in a blanket with a mug of hot-coco.
Ok but why tf was my dad so nostalgic and determined to find and watch this literal children incest movie? Toto’s only personality trait is needing just a drop of his sister’s pussy so bad that he will spend the entirety of his life looking for it, to the extent that he will literally homewreck a happy marriage because the wife looks like his long lost pre-pubescent sister. Toto’s mortal enemy wants a slice of that sweet pussy pie as well except it’s also incest puss for him because he and Toto were switched at birth. Some days are good, and other days you sit on the couch with your family and watch a pre-pubescent boy grope his sister’s barely budding breasts.
