Les roseaux sauvages

How do teenagers grow-up? Andre Techine's camera gives us a cool and respectful view into their emotions. Elodie Bouchez, playing sixteen-year-old Maite, in particular, projects emotion with a quiet dignity. It is remarkable how much is going on while the film seems so quiet. Maybe it is the durability of French countryside that calms the children and us.

The children realistically explore their budding sexuality with all dimensions treated in a straightforward and sensitive manner. The children await the results of their baccalaureate exam, the culmination of French High School education and the key to their professional lives. The natural developmental and educational issues that teenagers face are compounded by the turbulence of the times. And what turbulence surrounds these children! A violent, unpopular, and un-winable war to retain colonial ownership of Algeria strikes directly into this small French village as one child looses his brother and another his homeland. The latter plans bloody revenge against those whom he believes betrayed France until he realizes that Maite, a girl he loves, would be his target. Maite's mother is overwhelmed by guild and institutionalized by fear that her lack of action may have led to the brother's death.

Oh, and there is some great American rock and roll that somehow fits in; it must be that enduring French countryside.

This was a really sensitive and perceptive story about growing up and some of the pain and confusion that goes along with that. The movie is quite quiet and doesn't feel the need to comment on everything as so many American movies do. It is the story of four young French people growing up in Provence in France in the 60s and one of the boys has a homo-erotic experience and thinks that the other boy with whom he has the experience must have enjoyed it. The other boy regrets the experience that he had and when his brother dies in the war in Algeria, he feels obliged to support his family and so declines to pursue any sort of homosexual relationship. He wants to live a respectable sort of life and doesn't want to cause any trouble. The young gay boy is very confused but is a good friend to the teacher's daughter. They enjoy dancing and seeing films and learning about various things. The girl ends up falling for a rather lazy young man who has very different political views than herself. The movie is beautifully filmed and very relaxed and slow. It is a nice reflective movie on the nature of youth and some of the struggles that kids go through. The kids handle the struggles in the typical manner of kids. Sometimes they don't handle them very well and other times they show remarkable grace and common sense. But all in all it is a wonderfully gimmick free movie which really shows how difficult it is to be a kid in any place and at any time. I would really recommend this movie to people.

Les roseaux sauvages (1994) was shown in the U.S. with the translated title Wild Reeds. It was co-written and directed by André Téchiné.

The movie is set in 1962, just at the end of the Algerian War of Independence. To fully understand and enjoy the movie, it's helpful to know the basics. French soldiers were still being sent to Algeria to oppose independence. The OAS was a right-wing group in Algeria and France that wanted to retain French colonial power.

We don't see Algeria in the movie--the action takes place in and around Toulouse, in southern France. The film is a coming-of-age movie for four young adults.

Élodie Bouchez portrays Maïté Alvarez, the only woman of the four. Gaël Morel is François Forestier, Stéphane Rideau plays Serge Bartolo, and Frédéric Gorny portrays Henri Mariani.

The three young men are studying in a boarding school. Maïté's mother teaches at the school. She and her daughter are both Communists, and they believe in Algerian independence.

The movie examines a few weeks in their lives. These weeks are filled with self-discovery and interaction among the four adolescents. Some of the events are profound and will change what happens to them in the future.

We saw the film on DVD. It would work better on the large screen, but it was OK on the small screen. The movie has a solid IMDb rating of 7.4. I thought it was better than that and rated it 8.

This film is truly amazing. I saw it and was so moved by it that I couldn't stop thinking about it for a very long time. It is heavily based on the director's (Andre Techine) real life experiences. In this film Techine manages to create a realistic and palpable universe which seems which if you know anything about film is a very hard thing for directors to accomplish. I asked a French DP and a friend of Andre Techine about Les Roseaux Sauvages and he told me that it was originally made for television and that it was such an enormous sensation in France that it later was released in the theaters and won many awards at the Cesars in Paris - France's equivalent of the Oscars. I will admit that some American friends of mine went to see this film and didn't get it. What a pity for them.

On all fronts WILD REEDS is a top-notch drama - offering a look into the lives of 4 teenagers at a boarding school in rural France in the early 60s, this film is complex and immaculately well-made. Unusual in films depicting adolescence, WILD REEDS is complex and sophisticated, respectful of its' characters' varying sexualities (and their struggles to accept same), while also offering other glimpses of their intelligence and growing independence: views on the Algerian war, which was then raging, and on communism (with one character defined as communist, and another as an ardent anti-communist). The lush cinematography is summery and beautiful throughout, and the cast (most whom have gone on to other notable films) is great throughout.

Techine's direction gives the many strands of this story a great, personal feel - the shoe store scene stands out as an honest depiction of an individual recognizing and trying to accept his sexuality, and attempting to identify other gay people, as a way of lessening isolation, and in an attempt at spontaneously finding some sort of role model. Very thoughtful and very well-made.