Cold Water

What a splendid film. I was amazed only just now to discover the, oh so 70s set film, was made as recently as the 90s. Clearly the work put in by Assayas in his early films, where he clearly struggled against the odds and low budgets to get his feelings across have culminated to bare fruit here. Not 100% clear all the time yet the feeling is always right, we believe even if we do not understand fully, the actions and the motivations. Sadness, anger, loss and revenge lurk but a youthful energy raises this up and despite our struggles with the sense of the odd scene we find ourselves prepared for the ecstasy of the 70s music and drug fuelled trance like bonfire sequence at the centre of this extremely well made film. From there things become a little more predictable even if we find ourselves hopelessly in denial, like the characters portrayed so beautifully before us. Marvellous.

I would have thought by now I couldn't be haunted by yet another film about teen-age lovers and outsiders. Yet Assayas' lovely and bleak "Cold Water" is a valuable entry into this crowded, but rarely truly insightful field.

It's 1972. Touching on class, racism and other issues, the film follows Christine and Gilles, who live on the outskirts of Paris. Both are delinquents, indulging in petty crime and feeling outside society. But while Gilles has at least some care and support at home, Christine has a father whose only reaction to her confusion and pain is to lock her away in mental institutions. It's hard to tell where Christine's vicious cycle began. She's clearly unbalanced, but was that inevitable? Or has the act of imprisoning her, ignoring and drugging her pain, not only failed to treat her troubles, but actually caused them?

Assayas manages to take two lost, inarticulate heroes, and make us not only care about them, but identify and see ourselves in them. You don't have to have an adolescence nearly this extreme to understand the kind of inarticulate ache and anger of youth.

Not every moment works, and it could be argued that even at 90 minutes the film can feel too long for its very simple story. But whenever a film-maker takes an overused subject and finds something new to say about it, you have to take notice.

Frustratingly it continues to be unavailable in the U.S. on DVD, blu-ray or for legal download or online viewing. Given the film's excellent reputation, I can only assume that has to do with the expense of rights to the film's amazing soundtrack of 1970s music.

I'm not saying it's a bad film, but it definitely isn't great. It's awkwardly filmed, the actors don't deliver any emotion. It's somehow.... dull. For a movie which should explode with emotion, this one just doesn't deliver. It has a good soundtrack, a good story (though very common), but the rest is blank. Not even the lines are worth any attention. I understand this is a low budget, independent film, but unlike others I've seen, it didn't get my attention.

Taking a low-key approach to events that are only earth-shaking to the people involved, Asseyas has made something beautiful and moving from the lives of teenagers not that different from everyone else. The inevitable tragedy plays out with complete naturalness. And the entire sequence of the party at the empty house, rhythmed by the music, is breathtaking.

This is an interesting film about two teenage French lovers, both from troubled homes. The boy has the typical, at times overbearing and at other times inattentive, divorced father. The girls' home-life is much worse. Her father gains custody of her just so he can commit her to an institution. Her mother is well-meaning, but has troubles of her own, being mixed up with Scientology and a violence-prone Muslim boyfriend. After the girl escapes from the institution, the pair rendezvous at a party/bonfire at an abandoned house (an interesting scene that takes up nearly the whole middle third of the movie); they then go on the lam together.

America/Hollywood has made many (really way too many) movies about teens, most of which are typically saccharine and very cliché-ridden. The French, on the other hand, often make movies with teens (especially teen girls) who are worldly and sophisticated beyond their years and typically involved in sexual affairs with angst-filled middle-age men. This movie really avoids either of these tedious moulds, and given that, and the general lack of over-the-top drama, this one of the more realistic teen movies I've seen, either from France OR America. Given the music, I think it might have been set sometime before 1994 (maybe the 70's) and could have been a personal story for the filmmakers.

French beauty Virginie Ledoyen is, of course, much more attractive than your typical alienated teenage girl, even given a startling scene where she gives herself a very bad haircut on-screen while her emotionally disturbed character is wandering around the house party (to the tune of Janis Joplin's rendition of "Me and Bobbi McGee"). Her bad haircut and surprisingly very decent acting almost make her seem like a normal troubled teen girl for awhile (at least, until she takes all her clothes off at the end and reminds us we're in the presence of rare, unattainable beauty--but then I guess that's a stupid thing to complain about). I know less about the young actor playing the boy, but he's very decent too. The adults in the movie are believably ineffectual while the teens and teen extras are believably inarticulate (it's nice not to hear the kind of precocious trendy teen-speak that American movies are always lousy with).

I've seen a lot of French movies about teens recently (or, at least, ridiculous sexy French teen girls) like "Noce Blanche" and "Elisa" (with Vanessa Paradis and Gerard Depardieu), "La Boum" (with a young Sophie Marceau), and "L'Ennui" (with Sophie Guillemin). This may or may not be the best, but it is certainly the most realistic.