L'enfant

Earlier this evening, I was attending the premiere of "L'Enfant" in Belgian theaters.

"L'Enfant" shows us a socio-drama, with a story located in the southern region of Belgium, in a city called Seraing, where most movies of the Dardenne brothers are situated.

I will not go into any plot summaries, but let me make a comparison with other directors, so you might get a clue if you'd like to watch this movie or not. Socio-drama is a genre in film not only made in Belgium. Many great directors have made solid socio-drama's: Aki Kaurismaki, Ken Loach, Mike Leigh and many others.

Where you can find a twist of humor in Kaurismaki's movies, you'll have a hard time finding it in "L'Enfant". A high level of realism avoids any dramatization of the struggle-for-life the protagonists experience. This makes it for the viewer not easier to swallow. The absence of a soundtrack even increases this effect.

This movie has many strong points, and although I haven't seen many of the other films who were competing with "L'Enfant" at the Cannes film festival 2005, I think this film has fairly won the Palme d'Or because it scores very high on the essential aspects of film-making: acting, camera-work (see comment by Toon Creemers) and script (dialogues).

I highly recommend this movie, but don't expect to be visually entertained the way we are used to by big budget films from Hollywood. Movies like these don't need a lot of dialogue, fancy one-liners or historical quotes - the picture says it all, in a simple but effective way.

Enjoy,

Although I have not seen all other Cannes' comp. films, I think this is a worthy winner of the Palm d'or. The film's scenery is gray Seraing, like the previous Dardenne films, and I think this is the first film in which the camera-work complements the scenery and story near perfectly. Scene's often contain only one or two shots, cutting right when everything has been said. Its one of the few films where I did not notice the camera (I'm a student cameraman), which should be the goal of every cameraman, at least in this style of film. The acting is very impressive (especially Jeremie Renier as Bruno), like previous Dardenne Films. The film seems the most accessible Dardenne so far, although it does not bore in simplicity (I saw it twice in one week, avant-premiere and sneak preview, and I liked the second time best).

L'infant belongs to Sophie and Bruno, both feckless, petty criminals, in a seedy Belgian city. She has just come out of prison (?)with the newborn. She goes to their apartment but finds that Bruno has sublet the place to a bilious couple, so she has to track Bruno down at work trying to cadge small change from passers by. He is pleased to see her but diffident towards his son: Jimmy.

They spend the night in a shelter, or rather she does, as he cuts his time short to fence his stolen goods to a woman who drops a hint that if they're not up to raising a child they could adopt it out for a good price.

After showing us how they can only seem to communicate through adolescent rough housing, we are left with the distinct impression that they are too immature for parenthood. A few days later, while they wait in line, Bruno offers to walk the baby. He then sells it to a baby selling gang, and returns to show Sophie the wad of cash. Sophie passes out from shock.

We see not one wit of shame or guilt from Bruno up to this point. He is, we presume, an amoral street thug, out for how to make the next buck, and found the baby to good an opportunity to pass up for a sizable reward. Besides, given the empty life the baby will be looking forward to, the adoption by a better off couple doesn't seem to be bad for the child.

Sophie passing out seems to bring him to his senses. Is he remorseful? Does he love her? Up to this point all we have seen of their relationship is one of two vapid adolescent children, with no hint of any plans to make a future for their off-spring.

He carries her to a hospital and starts calling his go between to have the deal undone. At this point his motivation is left deliberately unclear. Is he doing so because he regrets his actions and needs to make it up to Sophie, or is he doing it because her accusations are over heard by the staff and the police will soon be carting him off to jail? In any event he manages to get the child back, giving up the E5,000 without a whimper, but then faces the angry brokers who are now out their E5,000. When he returns to the hospital with the baby the police are there and he makes up the story that he was just pretending to sell the child as revenge for her infidelity, and then calmly disowns the child as his.

Sophie refuses to talk with him and the police have to back off, and at this point in the movie we are no clearer to discerning any hint of empathy stirring in Bruno's pock marked face. I felt sorry for Sophie in her realization that her lover is as calloused as his feet, but presumed she would soon allow him back into her life. Yet as morally revolted as I was by Bruno, I still wanted to see if he could manage some kind of redemption.

The movie ends in leaving us to answer that question ourselves.

The crux of the movie is Bruno's character, or lack of it. He is no sociopath; he is not evil; his bland personality is as banal and unattractive as cold soup. He seems to not be dangerous, until faced with too much temptation to his greed. Yet he is difficult to hate. He is like that black sheep relative we all have and shake our heads about, so that we can whistle past the graveyard of our own inadequacies. He is what humanity can become when the spirit slumbers. He is society's unwitting sin eater.

The Dardennes, who won their second Palme d"Or at Cannes this year with "L'Enfant" (The Child), describe it as "a love story that is also the story of a father." Twenty-year-old Bruno (Jérémie Renier) is a petty thief and scam artist in Seraing, an east Belgian steel town, who lives off his girlfriend's welfare and impulsively spends whatever he steals. When eighteen-year-old Sonia (Déborah François) returns after the birth of their son Jimmy, Bruno's far worse than merely unready to accept the responsibility of fatherhood. Unbeknownst to Sonia, he decides to sell the baby on the black market. The film is about what happens following this grotesquely ill-advised decision. Who is really the "child" here? Well, clearly the story is about Bruno.

"L'Enfant" is urgent with movement and has little talk. As with the 1996 "La promesse" (The Promise, 1996), where Jérémie Renier debuted, "Rosetta" (1999), and "Le Fils" (The Son, 2003), the action is ceaseless and obsessive and seems almost real-time. But the Dardennes make every minute count. In those rare moments when the hyper-kinetic Bruno is momentarily still and the camera looks into his face, there's a strong sense of the doubt that will lead to his transformation. When Bruno tells Sonia "I'm sorry," or "I need you" and "I love you" the words carry weight because he doesn't normally ever say such things. But Sonia says, "You lie as you breathe." "L'Enfant" is as powerful and accomplished as anything the Dardennes have done, and as thought-provoking.

I can't say that I'm a fan of the previous Dardennes' movies... Saw Rosetta and "Le fils" and... well... didn't really go INTO them as I would have liked... probably because of the way (at the time) they were filmed ... sort of "dogma inspired" way of filming... following the neck/back of the characters, moving all the time... that makes me sea-sick... That's a detail that can make you laugh but something that disturbs me a lot from the story and that must not be used all the time in a film I think...

To me, the film is first a love story between two young people, two kids in a way (more the guy than the girl) more than a social drama... a true one... but nevertheless standing in a social context that is obviously proposed from the first images, and that counts and is indissociable from the characters and what they live and are living in.

What I felt is a real empathy for those two young lovers... Their love, their strength - each one trying to find a future, a new future... with their own means... Through money, through surviving, through a baby... through tears and the rare basic things of life they know or have been taught of...

It's 1h35 you're watching a young man grow...

My great enthusiasm for the film is also because of the actors. Jeremie Renier and Deborah Francois... They shine, they tremble and they're so true... I will also add the young boy who play Steve.. The film wouldn't be as touching without them... Wonderful belgian actors !!! BEST wishes to you all, you deserve it ! (Little moment of chauvinism, sorry LOL... anyway...

This is a film I would recommend...