Camping sauvage

I went to see this for Denis Lavant's face. He's up there with Kinski in my book in terms of a poetic cinematic visage. Anything he's in is worth watching based on this virtue alone.

Good directors know how to work with this and can make the movie be very rewarding. But unfortunately, there is nothing special here. The focus is on the character and the story. So we have a series of medium shots all throughout. This is a sad shame. He seems to know this. He locks his jaw with less vigor, and there is no pursing of the lips.

Notice the way he looks when in jeans. Lavant is the only 40-something man who can pull this off. I believe it's a posture problem. He has the frame of a 15 year old, but his mannerisms are those of an adult. Carax worked with this by making him wear those tattered baggy pants.

Lavant apart, this is a very good example of how not to make a movie. It lacks form. It might as well have remained the newspaper clipping it was inspired by. In fact, it seems like they took the journalistic approach: factual and logical. Not cinema.

Also, they quote his limp from _Lovers On the Bridge_ here, for the finale. Cheap shot. But it made me very happy.

It is amazing the French can churn out so many well-acted, complex stories about relationships and American filmmakers cannot even get close. An unattractive loser is thrown a life-line by his wife's brother and given a job as a camp counselor (sailing instructor). The camp is aflame with currents of lust, rebellion and resentment. Camille is so angry about her own coming of age insecurities and controlling father who is living in the past thinking she should still be his little girl, that she despises him and attacks everyone. Everything she does now is to hurt him and assert control of her life, even if only symbolically.

She goes after the counselor who is a decent man but himself buried in troubles. She cannot go anywhere without flopping or showing her magnificent boobies. She is one part flirt and 9 parts hormonal nightmare. The gentle old guy submits and she leads him down a path of self destruction and lunacy taking herself out along the way.

This is a pretty stereotypical French movie in a lot of ways. It takes place entirely in a holiday camp (the French always seem to be on vacation in their movies). It also involves a middle-age man having a torrid affair with a sexy teenage girl. They call these May-December affairs in the English-speaking world, but with the French it might be more April-December (or maybe late March) as the characters, and sometimes the actresses as well, often seem to be a little shy of eighteen.

To his credit, Dennis Lavant does not look to be in December of his years (early October maybe) and, unlike with some French films, it's not completely inconceivable that a bored teenage girl camping with here parents could fall for him, and even leave her more age-appropriate boyfriend. Of course, his character is also a paroled convict, married with children, and working at the camp for his brother-in-law. Pretty much everyone objects to the affair--the brother-in-law, the girl's parents, her friends, the other camp employees--but the two simply cannot resist each other. It's good old French amour fou, but it turns out to eventually be a VERY extreme case of it, and the film eventually becomes more than a little implausible.

Lavant is the more famous actor here, but mention should also be made of his co-star, Isilde LeBesco. Yes, she is kind of ordinary looking in the face. Yes, she's not terribly convincing as a 17-year-old. But she has one of the most incredible natural bodies I've ever seen and she ALWAYS shows it off in every movie she's in. Besides, she's certainly not a bad actress, and being from a more permissive country with no Hollywood reputation to protect, she takes on some interesting, if not always successful (or particularly believable)roles. She's one of a long line of French actresses, who are simply more sexy and uninhibited on the screen than the vast majority of their Hollywood peers. This is easily the worst movie of hers I've seen, but she and Dennis Lavant do manage to rise above the ho-hum material to make it marginally worthwhile.

This little French drama was relased in France during summer 2006 and only a bunch of folks saw it. I undertsand because of the cast and also the topic. Nothing to do with Fabien Oteniente's CAMPING. This is a pure drama, very moving, slow but riveting, where Denis Lavant brings a terrific performance. A story that may "speak" to many folks, very realistic. Not a thriller, but only a character study concerning young but also mature audiences. Closer to DUPONT LAJOIE than CAMPING. I really love the Denis Lavant's character, there should be more like this one in films. Isild Le Besco - Maïwenn's sister in true life - is also excellent in her role. Downbeat story.

Let's see; a 17 year old girl falling for a guy 2 1/2 times her age, 10x ugly to her 10x gorgeous, stupid beyond comprehension, a mentally disturbed teenage mind inside a 50 yr. old man's body ... what's not to like? With all that, the poor girl obviously just couldn't help herself. Wow.

The age difference is the least of the problems (not really a problem at all, by itself). But the characterizations of both protagonists were just so overdrawn, and in a very sloppy way. It was great that the directors let us see the lovely Isild Le Besco running like a gazelle on several occasions, but they made the viewers pay dearly for that privilege with their awful screen writing (the two were the same, if you look at the credits).

Definitely the worst French film I've ever seen, and in the bottom five of movies I've seen from anywhere.