You will follow this movie with much attention and interest in terms of images and scenes but I must confess I have found the story itself in terms of contents a bit uninteresting since the plot has some coincidences that make it somewhat unbelievable. A couple is going to fetch their children who are at a summer camp in the south west of France. They are going by car from the north. The husband is a drunkard and he not only drank a lot already before their ride starts but he also keeps stopping now and then to have a drink on bars along the road. They begin to have fierce arguments between themselves and she ends up by leaving the car on one of his stops. He is bewildered when he comes back to the car and doesn't see her. She had left a note saying she was going to catch a train. From then on a succession of appalling incidents take place making the course of events very dramatic. It's a movie that keeps you attentive and alert all the time despite the fact that the plot itself is not very interesting.

"Feux rouges" is an interesting thriller about a man searching for his wife. The plot turns when he meets a criminal and takes him up with his car on a night trip to Bordeaux. The film is thrilling until the end because you do not know what happens next. The audience is misled by some red herrings that could have been pulled out by Hitchcock. The herrings are no plot holes because the whole film is a dream. It begins with the man sitting in a bar waiting for his wife. Imagine you put this scene at the end of the movie with the man waking up out of a short sleep. It also explains the improbable happy ending and the dreamlike pictures of the night trip.Nevertheless, it could have been a better movie. Based on a story by Georges Simeon it lacks of character building. The characters are one-sided and not very likable. Underacting is sometimes part of the film noir, unfortunately it does not work here.

When I see a movie being compared to the works of Hitchcock, it is my duty as a film buff to go out and watch it. But even if you were too put all expectations aside, I'm sure you would find a film with a solid idea, great acting, and some very suspenseful sequences, but also a film filled with plot holes and an unsatisfying ending.The film begins with a French couple going on a car ride to pick up their kids. The man Antoine (superbly acted by an actor I can't remember)has been drinking and during their trip he and his wife Helene (also great, but does not have as much screen time) bicker about how Antoine is not treated like a man. He stops for another drink, whereupon his wife says she will leave if he steps out. Antoine takes the keys and goes out for a drink, but his wife is gone, leaving him a note that she has taken the train. These first 20 minutes provide an excellent set-up, but things really start to crumble from here.I know its great to have the audience know more than the character does, but don't make the character so stupid that it takes him 45 minutes to figure out what we already knew in 5. The hitchhiker Antoine picks up should have worn a sign that said "I am an escaped convict" to save us half the film of watching Antoine pour his heart out. Also, there are so many red herrings that I began to have the most absurd theories (why is his hand in his pocket? is the killer alive? what has Antoine been doing before he crashed? is this even real?!?!?). Regardless, there are still some nail-biting scenes here, two that strike me as particularly unnerving: the ten-minute telephone sequence that is just perfect, and Antoine's nightmare that had me literally jump out of my seat.But you forget how intense this movie was because the ending contains no real payoff. Yes, I know its not supposed to be about suspense. Yes, I know we should have to analyze it because it is deceptively happy. But unlike a similar but better French thriller "Swimming Pool", this movie wraps up all the terrible events in such a pat ending that you can see it in two different ways: an analysis of one man's primal psyche that is marketed as a thriller (this is what it's supposed to be about), or merely a thriller. In the end, this movie barely gives you room to analyze. And when you do reach the conclusion (if you bother to analyze at all), its not really a message that stays with you."Red Lights" is a nice diversion with great acting and some good suspense, but one can't look at a movie in pieces. Whereas great psychological thrillers are like Rubix cubes, this one simply takes a bunch of random puzzle pieces, wraps it up in shoddy paper, and forces you to figure it out, even though the pieces don't quite fit.

Just for the record there are at least as many blue lights as red lights glowing along the various roads they travel on. An interesting but strange movie, never quite got the gist of it. Good thing he found those rocks to put under the tire. Terrific main character acting in body and face language but I never felt anything for him or his wife. I like identifying with someone in the movie, lucked out on this one. And hey was there ever a more docile bad guy and whats with that hand stuck in his pant pocket, hmmm, strong head though. And as so often happens in todays movies the ending duffs instead of the marriage. Lets have some true life endings once in awhile. Oh well, I'll call it a like anyway, I did stay till the end.