Oublier Cheyenne

After a year of unemployment and fruitless job-searching, a despairing and frustrated Cheyenne (Mila Dekker) has decided "to go off the grid," as they say. Unable to pay her bills, she heads out on her bike to make her way in the world, sans the conveniences of modern life and a place to live. In fact, at this point, her disdain for society and all things related to 20th and 21st Centuries technology has become a sort of religion to her. Unfortunately, in order to follow this strict belief system, Cheyenne has to leave Sonia (Aurelia Petit), her girlfriend of several years, who is unable to bring herself to quit her secure job as a well-liked high school science teacher and join Cheyenne in her ascetic lifestyle. Further complicating matters is that, though an avowed lesbian, Sonia is also involved with Pierre (Malik Zidi), a good-natured lad who is deeply in love with Sonia and who wants her to have his baby.

The screenplay by Cecile Vargaftig and director Valerie Minetto is distinguished by the fact that Sonia keeps drifting in and out of reality, as the various people in her life suddenly appear on the scene and have imaginary conversations with one another. Yet, somewhat inexplicably, this conceit is dropped not too long into the film.

On the positive side, "Looking for Cheyenne" displays a sensitivity towards its characters and an understanding of the complexities of human relationships, but the unfocused storytelling, unconvincing resolution, and overall dour mood keep it from being as emotionally compelling as we would like it to be.

The movie earns points for being willing to explore how the recent economic downturn has affected the people of France, though the programmed sociopolitical diatribes that the characters occasionally break out into get to be a bit much after awhile.

Although LOOKING FOR CHEYENNE is most definitely a Lesbian film, it is not the clichéd, 'Coming Out Saga' which seems to permeate the genre. The characters in this film all have well established sexual identities, and their problems do not occur because of conflicting homosexual or heterosexual impulses, but are caused by situations which are more social or political in nature. Cheyenne and Sonia are lovers, and their relationship has spun out of control after Cheyenne loses her job as a journalist, and her benefits disappear. She cannot find employment, and decides to live outside of the system that has chosen to reject her. Sonia, on the other hand, is gainfully employed as a teacher, and although not entirely satisfied with her position, at least feels that she is providing a modicum of positive impact on society. This seems to be the core dilemma of the film, and other characters offer different shadings to the conflicting ideas of acceptance of the status quo, or complete disregard for the established order. The film doesn't really offer a solution, but shows the two main characters as they grapple with their personal issues against the backdrop of competing political ideologies. LOOKING FOR CHEYENNE is well shot, and, at times, engages a unique way of telling the tale in that the characters sometimes address the audience directly, and at other times, speak to other members of the cast in dreams or through hallucinatory sequences. Valérie Minetto, the director, has created a successful film which demonstrates the vicissitudes of Romance within the context of opposing views of authority and power.

Valerie Minetto is a director new to me: she has made an attractive little study of two women in love that has more interest than better known pictures like Kissing Jessica Stein. I like the way the film goes along without too many political distractions (although Cheyenne's year of unemployment is made much of), just trusting in the substance of the story.

Aurelia Petit has a sad look sometimes, concealing her doggedness. Teaching chemistry to bored adolescents is getting her down. Mila Dekker is sometimes shrill and sometimes winning. Laurence Cote as the rural activist leads us to question the validity of the back to the land movement; her cynicism in the realms of politics and love is off-putting.

The title is intriguing: what on earth is this film going to be about? When the first pictures appear on the screen they don't tell you much yet but at once captivate you by their strangeness and beauty: at a crossroads, in the night, a traffic light turns from red to green to red again and so on. Underneath, a lying figure stirs: it must be a homeless person. A ghost car crosses the frame and vanishes, then another. The cars multiply in the once deserted street. Meanwhile the traffic light invariably goes red, green, red, green... At last the homeless person - a woman it appears -wakes up and gets up while the opening credits roll against the newspaper she had been lying on as a backdrop. There is no specific answer to the initial question. The viewers still wonder: will this visually superb introduction give rise to a socially committed work (as the presence of the homeless woman suggests) or to an aesthetic one (judging from the elaborate colors, frames,geometrical shapes)?

Both actually, as they soon find out, and much more, since "Oublier Cheyenne" is about politics, philosophy, sex and love, and - a crucial point - NEVER AT THE EXPENSE OF ART AND STYLE. Given its subject, Valérie Minetto's film could be boring, moralizing and dry but the filmmaker never forgets art, sensitivity and originality. Any minute of this film is beautiful (the image -both mental and real- of the galloping horse), unexpected (with its characters going through walls, addressing the camera or speaking in the mind of others), relevant (the bitter portrait of our society crushing the individual) and moving (the true love that unites Sonia and Cheyenne in spite of everything).

And let's not forget Aurélia Petit's intense performance nor Malik Zidi's endearing charms. This is for sure one of the best French art films shown lately. Well done Miss Minetto!