Anything For Her

"You can't improvise. You got to be a born criminal." That's the advice given by an ex-con-turned-writer to Lucien (Lindon), who is contemplating busting his wife Lisa (Kruger) out of jail and going on the lam with their 4-year-old son Oscar (Roch). Lisa was sent down for the murder of her boss in an underground parking lot: her fingerprints were on the murder weapon (a fire extinguisher) and her boss's blood was on her jacket. Lisa insists that another woman murdered her boss but the jury weren't having it and Lisa got twenty years.

But this isn't Lisa's story - it's Lucien's. Lucien is a mild-mannered teacher struggling with bringing up his son on his own. After numerous attempts to clear her name, and because the diabetic Lisa has stopped taking her insulin in an attempted suicide, Lucien feels that time is running out to keep his family together. He goes about meticulously planning her escape - but how does one go about breaking someone out of prison? As the writer told him, every prison has a key and all you have to do is get your hands on it. Soon, a plan forms in his mind but Lucien has to do it all on his own...

Can an ordinary guy become a criminal? How far would you go to help a loved one? How low would you sink? What would you risk? Would you kill? They are the questions posed by Anything For Her, a sharp thriller that keeps he audience two steps behind its protagonist at all times. Director Cavayé, who doubles up as a writer here, goes to great pains to keep the audience in the dark - 'will they get away?' is a question asked throughout but the nicely crafted plotting keeps the outcome in doubt even as the climax approaches. It can get a little convenient when it wants to, but the performances (especially Lindon) and the ever-rising tension exonerates the easy contrivances.