Film Review
Director Diastème provoked a storm of controversy with his 2015 film
Un Français, which
served up an uncompromising but fairly accurate view of racism in modern
day France. His follow-up film,
Juillet août, is unlikely
to have anything like the same impact and, anodyne to a fault, it risks being
forgotten even before it has completed its first theatrical release.
The director's third feature shows nothing of the daring of its predecessor
but is a pleasant enough time waster, a typically Gallic take on adolescence
that cannot help looking like an updated version of Claude Miller's
L'Effrontée (1985).
Diastème admits to having been inspired by Ron Howard's
Parenthood
(1989), but other influences are all too readily spotted, notably Claude
Pinoteau's
La Boum (1980) and
Diane Kurys's
Diabolo menthe
(1977).
Released in July 2016,
Juillet août is typical summer fare for
French cinema screens, but thankfully it avoids most of the obvious clichés
and brings a freshness to an overly familiar genre that, quite frankly, has
been done to death in recent years. An astonishing contrast with Diastème's
previous film, this much sunnier feel-good offering manages to be sentimental
without being soppy, funny without being crude or cynical. The casting
choices are excellent, particularly the two lead actresses - Alma Jodorowsky
(granddaughter of the surrealist filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky) and Luna
Lou - who play the chalk-and-cheese sisters. As the gobby rebel Laura
(a female version of Jean-Pierre Léaud's Antoine Doinel in
Les 400 coups).
Lou virtually steals the film and is assuredly one of the most promising
French actresses to make her screen debut in 2016.
With strong support from Patrick Chesnais, Pascale Arbillot and Thierry Godard,
the film doesn't disappoint on the acting front but it is mildly let own
by a script that feels too flat and mechanical, lacking the spontaneity of
the performances and the mise-en-scène. With most of the film
shot using a handheld camera, it achieves an intimacy that forces us to see
the world from the perspective of the two wildly different sisters, the contrasting
moods of adolescence emphasised (perhaps a little too unsubtly) by the dramatic
shift in location from the sunny south to the miserable north.
Juillet
août is a likeable film but whilst it manages to avoid merely reproducing
similar coming-of-age pieces of the past it scarcely adds anything new to
the genre. What it does reveal, however, is Diastème's remarkable
versatility and a flair for conjuring up engaging slice-of-life cinema from
the most banal of subjects.
© James Travers 2017
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.
Film Synopsis
Laura and Joséphine are two teenage sisters who could hardly be more
different. With Laura, 14, happy to play the perpetual grouch, Joséphine,
18, has started taking an interest in the opposite sex. As is normal
for girls of their age, both are in a state of emotional confusion, and it
doesn't help that their parents are separated and live at opposite ends of
the country. During the summer, they divide their holidays between
their mother, who lives on the sunny Côte d'Azur, and their father,
who lives in rainy Brittany. The girls' mother has re-married, to Michel,
and is now expecting her third child - news that Laura takes badly.
As her sulky younger sister mopes about in boredom and contempt, Joséphine
starts an affair with an attractive young man named Romain. Back in
Brittany, the two girls' mood is not helped by the bad weather and they wonder
if they should break the news of their mother's pregnancy to their father.
As the summer drags on, Romain turns up to continue his affair with Joséphine...
© James Travers
The above content is owned by filmsdefrance.com and must not be copied.