Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
In this belated sequel to 'The Decline of the American Empire', middle-aged Montreal college professor, Remy, learns that he is dying of liver cancer. His ex-wife, Louise, asks their estranged son, Sebastian, a successful businessman living in London, to come home. Sebastian makes the impossible happen, using his contacts and disrupting the Canadian healthcare system in every way possible to help his father fight his terminal illness to the bitter end, while reuniting some of Remy's old friends, including Pierre, Alain, Dominique, Diane, and Claude, who return to see their friend before he passes on.
The Barbarian Invasions is a thoughtful, bittersweet Canadian drama that works best through its exceptional ensemble performances and its deeply affecting, gracefully handled ending. The cast, led by Rémy Girard and Stéphan Rousseau, brings remarkable naturalism and warmth to their roles, earning a well-above-average acting score. The ending — intimate, serene, and philosophically resonant — is one of the more memorable conclusions in early 2000s arthouse cinema, justifying a 4. The plot, while engaging in its meditation on mortality, friendship, and generational conflict between idealism and capitalism, follows a fairly familiar terminal-illness reunion structure. Cinematography is competent and unobtrusive without being particularly distinctive. Novelty is moderate — it's a sequel that stands on its own and has a distinctive Québécois cultural voice, but the broad strokes of the narrative are well-trodden territory. The film earned the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, reflecting its genuine quality without being formally groundbreaking.