Le Renard et l’enfant (2007) - film review

One crisp autumnal morning, a ten-year-old girl on her way to school strays from her path and encounters a wild fox.  The girl’s fascination for the magnificent creature overrides her instinct to run away and she is impelled to try to get nearer to it.  Naturally, the fox takes fright and runs off into the forest.  So enchanted by the fox is she that the little girl spends her leisure hours looking for him.  She finally manages to track the animal to its lair, and discovers that it is in fact a vixen which is protectively rearing its cubs.  Over the ensuing months, the little girl and the fox will form an intense empathic bond, a friendship like no other.  Through her close rapport with the fox, the girl discovers a world she has never seen before, one that is filled with beauty and wonder...

From the award winning team that brought us the stunning wildlife documentary La Marche de l’empereur (2005) comes this equally beguiling film which, part documentary, part fable, offers a well-timed reflection on man’s relationship with the natural world.  The simplicity of the story it tells and the sublime beauty of its composition makes it an enchanting piece for children and adults alike, a film that glows with warmth and tenderness, although it does have a serious message and doesn’t entirely spare us from some of nature’s darker habits.  Le Renard et l’enfant not only reveals to us the extraordinary beauty of the world in which we live, but also reminds us of our place in it, gently cautioning us that we should strive to live with nature rather than slavishly seek to control and tame it.  
 
Once again, director Luc Jacquet and his dedicated team perform wonders in their efforts to capture on film some of the unseen miracles of nature.  The film’s most striking sequences were shot by a four-man team over an arduous six month period in the Abruzzes National Park in central Italy, one of the oldest protected areas in Europe, a region inhabited by foxes, bears and other rare fauna.  Among the extraordinary sights that Jacquet’s team bring to us are a fox being pursued across a snowy terrain by a ferocious lynx, a vixen cowering nervously in her den with her recently born cubs, and the amazing spectacle of foxes gorging themselves silly on woodland crocuses.  It is unexpected images such as these which give the film most of its entertainment value and prevent it from dipping too far into whimsy and treacly sentimentality.  The scenes which make up the bulk of the film (shot in the Ain region of eastern France) are just as stunningly photographed, and at times it is impossible not to be overwhelmed by the sheer natural splendour that blazes from the screen.  There is also a fair amount of humour - e.g. the hilarious scene where the girl and the fox go frog hunting.

What makes Le Renard et l’enfant so enchanting is that, right from the very first shot, it immerses us in the world of its two protagonists, a rebellious little girl and a hyper-charismatic fox.  That we experience the world through their senses brings a heightened reality and a deeper emotional involvement to what we feel when watching the film.  It helps that the child character is realistically portrayed, not as some saccharine-coated goody two-shoes, but as something of a wild child, wilfully disobeying her parents and unintentionally inflicting cruelty on the object of her fancy.  Bertille Noël-Bruneau, the actress who plays the ten-year-old girl, was selected from 800 candidates and is perfectly cast, instantly engaging and without so much as a whiff of self-consciousness.  She even has a feral quality that makes her appear as at home in the woodland setting as her co-star, the fox Titou.  Sadly, this was to be Titou’s screen swansong - he died a few months after the film’s December 2007 release, at the grand old age of 12.

Le Renard et l’enfant is a film that is both pertinent and absorbing (marred only by an unnecessarily mawkish ending and some painfully twee narration).  For adults, it makes us aware of the burgeoning natural splendour that surrounds us and of our obligation not to trample all over it - this is the golden paradise we risk losing forever if we do not change our ways.  For children, there is an equally valuable lesson to be heeded - not to look on animals as furry toys but as noble creatures to be respected and allowed the freedom to roam in their own environment.  In an era of ever-increasing environmental awareness, the film’s gently phrased eco messages should be as well received as its spellbinding images and heart-warming tale of a little girl awakening to the unbridled beauty of the world in which she lives - an adult-friendly fairy tale for our times.

© James Travers 2011

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