Camping à la ferme

I just saw this movie and I must say that I recommend it to anyone who has ever wanted to see a movie that truly exposes the issues of living in a multicultural society. Although set in France, you can easily replace the setting and characters with any those of any western nation and have the plot still achieve it's purpose.

Although I wish there would not have been as many plot holes in the movie, the movie fulfills the goal of enlightening the audience about being a citizen of a multicultural society. I feel like I grew as a person after seeing the movie, seeing the characters become to their fullest potential as human beings. I cant rely on Hollywood to make a movie like this...

In this french film, social worker Amar (Roschdy Zem) is in charge of six small-time criminals (most of them immigrants, and including a white convert to Islam) whose only option for staying out of prison is to serve a month doing volunteer work in a small french village. Most of the all-white rural town don't want anything to do with them, with the exception of Anais (the lovely Julie Delarme) who lives with her father and her slightly retarded younger brother Leo. The movie shows how the group clash with the other villagers, and eventually repair mends with most of them (though never entirely). Although this is not a drama, I found in fact the movie quite poignant in showing the difficulties that France is facing (and will increasingly face) in integrating its rapidly growing immigrant population. The movie tries to put a somewhat optimistic face to this problem, but it ends up showing that there is little hope of finding a common ground between the immigrant and native population of France. Shot like a commercial comedy (in a fish out of water style), it's hard not to feel sad after watching it for the future of France.

I saw this excellent movie with my parents and two nephews (13 and 16 years old) : 3 generations (with me) and a real pleasure for everybody. The story is both funny (very !) and moving. Life in the country is well observed. The contrast between teenagers from Parisian suburbs and deep country way of life is fascinating. Characters evolve a lot during the story : adolescents are quite self-centred at the beginning, and we can notice a big change at the end, because they had a great experience in the meantime. In the leading role, Roschdy Zem is brilliant (a great underrated talent). We can easily feel how much each character is accurate, without cheating. Definitely recommend this movie to everyone who likes laughing, being moved, surprised. Go to this Camping, you'll not regret it !

Rather than serving a prison sentence, a bunch of delinquent teenagers is offered to work for one month in the country in a small village with their instructor (Roschdy Zem). As they come from high-risk suburbs and they aren't prepared for this exhausting life, this obligatory stay will prove to be grueling for them. And most inhabitants of the village aren't prepared to accept them.

Jean Pierre Sinapi signed two strong works before this "Camping à la Ferme": "Nationale 7" (2000) and "Vivre me Tue" (2002). In these films, the director got interested in human beings who were different to the world that surrounded them and learned how to accept their differences. "Camping à la Ferme" is virtually in the same league but a little below the quality of the two aforementioned works. How many times in cinema have we seen the well-worn topic of the clash of two cultures? Each young delinquent acts a too well known type of adolescent between the Muslim one and the business one. The inhabitants of the village are hostile to them, especially Dominique Pinon who acts a racist farmer. The film follows a predictable pattern with the usual ingredients: the discovery and respect of difference, generosity and love. What doesn't help matters is the educator who is tangled in his loving problems.

But Sinapi seemed aware of these dangers and he tried not to spread them too much in his film. Thus, his film is never crass or vulgar and at a pinch, it shouldn't be lambasted. But he should have deepened more the original points his scenario offered. Be that as it may, it's often funny and Roschdy Zem is in the right tone in his role and if his young partners seemed too caricatured, they're larger than life.

The director didn't like the title of his film which he deemed as "trite". I agree with him and in the end, we have a watchable product which tries to avoid as much as possible most of its tempting dangers but which should have gained by trusting some of its original directions. It's good for one viewing but that's all.