Lolita 90

(Note: Over 500 of my movie reviews are now available in my book "Cut to the Chaise Lounge or I Can't Believe I Swallowed the Remote!" Get it at Amazon.)

This is a love story off the beaten track clearly in the tradition of Louis Malle and Francois Truffaut, told without prudishness or gratuitous violence.

The title refers to a children's dress size that the 14-year-old lead, Lili, played with snap by Delphine Zentout, is bursting out of. Billed as a "French Lolita," Zentout is not all that fetching at first glance. She's a chubbette with light skin and thick black hair and not exactly pretty. But she has intriguing eyes and a saucy way about her.

Lili is "discovering" her sexuality, but won't let herself be impregnated. The playboy, played with grace and economy by Jean-Pierre Leaud, falls in love with her in spite of himself and "tolerates" her reluctance while being partially satisfied in other ways, one of which we used to call a "cold f..." They are a believable match because sexually they are equal: she precocious, he experienced.

Catherine Beillat directs without sentimentality while guiding Zentout to an interpretation that transcends the American brat style and leads us to a thoughtful view of feminine sexuality.

I should of known this was a Catherine Brelliat film, some of this one, feeling much like that messy Fat girl. This isn't a badly made film and does have some very hot moments. A young 14 year old girl, holidaying, wants to experience sexual pleasure with older guys and lose her virginity. She meets a playboy, twice her age, plus. Instant attraction. Over the span of the night, while engaging in boozing, dancing, and sexual encounters with this the stranger, comes that special moment, where she is to lose it, but has second thoughts. This very much frustrates the mid thirties guy, who really should be in prison. Comes another night where the two become more intimate. The movie really rides on this scenario, which it tells the views of both these characters and takes it's time, in what is a very realistic scenario, which is what I really liked about this movie. Although it's not Brielliat's best, this earlier effort from this controversial director, is definitely worth it's view, where I will re iterate, the film does feel a lot like Fat Girl, even the familiar settings. True to life, these sexual encounters happen, where choices to continue, or cross the line have resulted in arrests, due to girls below the age of consent. A quite beautifully flowing film. The young actress gives a really mature and professional performance.

36 Fillette is an aimless journey of coming of age by a 14 year old girl played extremely well by Delphine Zentout. She talks her brother into taking her to a disco where she is eventually taken advantage of by a much older man played by Etienne Chicot. She is an angry girl whose home life leaves a lot to be desired. This film really has no point other than to continually think of ways for an older man to have sex with a 14 year old girl. Pass on this meaningless story. Too bad as the acting was very good.

Early on we can clearly see that despite being in a woman's body, this character is still a girl, as she fights like a kid with her brother. She's only 14 and seems eager to lose her virginity, but has both a repugnance for the people around her and a sense of vulnerability when she puts herself in compromising situations, like the hotel room of a middle-aged man. She flirts and teases to test her power over men but is mixed up about what to do with it once she has it, and I guess it's this liminal period in a girl's life that Breillat is exploring (apparently somewhat autobiographically).

Meanwhile men old enough to be her father (and a woman as well) look at her as fresh prey, making this a pretty creepy story. Her own brother tells a guy in a bar that "She's a juicy pear. Ripe for picking." Ugh. As the film involves repeated encounters between the girl (16 year old Delphine Zentout) and the middle aged guy (39 year old Étienne Chicot) which lead to nudity and sex acts that are as awkward for the characters as they are for the audience, it was a tough one for me to like. It wasn't always clear Breillat wasn't capitalizing on the salacious concept either, and when I read she didn't even know Zentout's age when she cast her and was lucky she had just turned 16 days before shooting started, it made me wonder about her approach to this.

On the positive side there is a degree of empowerment in the girl's character, as she's able to tell the middle-aged guy "no" even after he's been massaging her to arousal, and the next day tells him acerbically "Next time you need to ejaculate, I'm not a sink!" Her father beats her for staying out all night and being a "little sl*t," to which she screams "It's my life, not yours!" When she ultimately decides to lose her virginity to an intellectual boy who likes reading Dostoevsky and Camus, she commands him during the (brief) act to "Stop dribbling on me! What are you waiting for! Go on!" Even though this seems like such a sad group of characters all around (too sad for me, really), there is strength in the girl's smile at the end, and some belief that she'll navigate her way into adulthood on her own terms.

For me what the film could have used more of was the little scene with Jean-Pierre Leaud, who says these lines so skillfully: "We think we're in a rut, but we aren't. The world's a huge place. It's a giant box spring mattress. You bounce on it and land somewhere else. You think you're in a rut, that the world will cave in on you, but it's not true. Just land in a different place."

36 Fillette or "Virgin" which is the English title, is a film set in France which portrays a couple of days in the life of a 14 year old girl who trying to explore her sexuality for the first time. She meets a play boy who at first she teases and does not want to make love to which enfuriates him but as the film goes on the guy starts to have second thoughts and the tables are turned. While this film is engrossing , and maybe only for voyeuristic reasons ,it does have the problem that most French films do, which is far to much diologue. The acting is a plus point. 6 out of 10.