Ahhh! I have been searching high and low for this Xavier Dolan series, The Night Logan Woke Up, after watching the first two episodes during Sundance this past January. Finally, the French Canadian series found its US home on Netflix.
The series, based on the play of the same name (but in French), focuses on the Larouche family in Quebec after the death of the family matriarch, Maddy. While we are privy to most of the present day struggles of this family, we get flashes back to 1991 which seemed to be the catalyst of this family’s chaos. Though we don’t learn the truth of what happened on Halloween night until the very end of the series, each flashback proves more and more the connection between Maddy and her two eldest children, Julien and Mireille. On the eve of Maddy’s passing, middle child Denis is on hand to look after her, but goes to fetch youngest child, Elliot so they can be with Julien and his family in her final moments.
Elliot is combating substance abuse at a rehab facility at the time, and though he thinks he’s strong enough to leave the facility for his mother’s funeral, that doesn’t end up being the case. Denis, for all of his protectiveness, seems to have a floundering personal life. He’s a little bit on the outs with his wife and his children don’t always know how to communicate with him. He copes with these stresses by hoarding in his Quebec home. Julien, married to his college sweetheart, Chantal, raise a kind of bratty teen while he goes back to school. Julien seems like an animal trapped in a cage. Though he looks serene and put together on the outside, things he does in secret makes it obvious he’s maybe not living truthfully.
Mireille comes back into town at the request of her mother to perform her embalming. Her presence back in town has Denis and Elliot thrilled, but Julien is quite cold to her. Not that she treats him any more warmly. It’s clear that these two are at the center of what went down in 1991. And I’ll tell you what wet down. Mireille was an odd teenager who couldn’t really sleep, so she would sneak into people’s homes in the middle of the night and just hang out. One night, she did this to her crush, and Julien’s best friend, Logan. The next morning, Mireille is removed with a glazed and vacant look in her eyes. Apparently word gets around that she was raped by Logan, but as most things are for women, this was Mireille’s fault. She spends the rest of her high school years being ridiculed by her peers and looked down upon by her mother, who doesn’t actually believe anything happened at all.
That’s all I’ll say regarding the plot, but please, pleas watch all five episodes of this series. It’s suspenseful all the way through, but the events that transpire in the final two episode are really something else. I really don’t hope this is the last of Dolan’s efforts like he announced earlier this year. All of his work that I’ve seen so far has been really compelling and I selfishly want more!