O Porco Espinho

This film is so good I wanted it to run forever. The unfolding of characters, especially Paloma --the 11 years old girl--and the Concierge of the building, are so masterful, that one seats there mesmerized waiting to see the new developments.

The concierge character is a tour de force. The way she starts, as an obscure caretaker, moving the trash cans of the rich neighbors out on the sidewalk --only five huge de luxe apartments at her charge-- retrieving the empty containers the next morning and always moody and dry (as she herself puts it to Paloma, the girl, "the perfect concierge" according to the accepted urban legend about concierges in people's mind), and then because of her unexpected interacting with that precocious girl and the impeccable Japanese new neighbor, her subtle but unstoppable changes are something to be seen (as are also the changes in Paloma and the perfect Japanese new neighbor).

The little girl's mother, psychoanalyzed and medicated, watering her plants and talking to them (I do it too) with much more love and infinite care than to her own daughter, is fully drawn in a very succinct and accurate way.

Paloma is left alone to her own devices, and they only consist of an old fashioned movie camera --her father's gift to her-- perennially in front of her face (she films everything that moves) and her drawings (delightful) where she expresses her most inner thoughts.

This is a perfect example of a French film --I ADORE this type of French cinema--where very little happens but in such an intimate and delicate communion with the viewer that it absorbs one's mind completely, and doesn't let go till the very end, in the most poignantly and unexpected possible way, as it's the case in the present film. See it, it's totally worth your while.

I only wish you'll enjoy it as much as I did. Precious.

This concierge lives a dull life on the surface. She,s fat, ugly and unkind. In her own views anyway. But she has her cat and her books. Just quality literature.

Then this 11-year-old girl turns up, who lives in a truly dysfunctional family. And so does this old cultivated Japanese man. He sees her and the girl sees her. And they also see what's inside the hedgehog.

A warm and hopeful film about a character you meet every day, anywhere, and don't think much about. Which obviously is a mistake. People who are seen will show things you never thought you and they had. Regardless of their hedgehog physiognomy

Greetings again from the darkness. The directorial feature debut from Mona Achache is based on the French bestseller "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" by Muriel Barbery. The meticulous pace masks whirlwind of emotion and thought occurring in the three key characters. Three characters whom each of us could be guilty of overlooking on a daily basis.

For those who don't know, the film defines a hedgehog as a prickly-on- the-outside, cuddly-on-the-inside critter that is often misjudged. Our three characters all fit this description in some manner. Paloma (Garance LeGuillermic) is an 11 year old girl who plans to kill herself on her 12th birthday because no one understands her and her life is filled with what are the minor inconveniences of being an 11 year old - her mother talks to plants more than she talks to her, her father is a distracted workaholic, and her self-centered teenage sister is, well, a self-centered teenager. Madame Renee Michel (Josiane Balasko) is the building's caretaker. Self-described as old and ugly, she lives the life of quiet desperation, hiding with her cat and massive library of books and chocolate. The building's new tenant is Kakuro Ozu (Togo Igawa), a mysterious and elegant man who immediately sees through Madame Michel's prickly exterior.

Paloma spends much of her day documenting by video camera the goings on in her life and of those in her building. She often adds her insightful and humorous narrative to the scene as it occurs. Her view on life and its possibilities begins to change as she observes and gets to know Madame Michel and Mr. Ozu, and more importantly, observes their interactions.

The underlying storyline of an 11 year old girl contemplating suicide can be quite disturbing, but director Achache never really lets that occur. Instead we focus on very simple acts of kindness and subtle smiles and gestures that indicate life can be rewarding and worthwhile. I also found Madame Michel's surrender to the state of invisibility to be quite disturbing, but her awakening to be fascinating. She had not been rejected by society as much as simply overlooked.

Unlike many French movies that bombard us with rapid fire, overlapping exchanges, this one instead relies on patience and a sharp eye ... think of it as the slight squeeze while holding a loved one's hand.

Mona Achache's movie "Le hérisson" ("The Hedgehog" in English) is about a Parisian girl leading an unfulfilled life with her affluent family, and so she decides to commit suicide on her twelfth birthday. In the process of filming her apartment and family, the girl befriends the concierge.

The movie presents a good contrast between the girl's disillusionment with her posh but superficial world and the concierge's appreciation of what little she has, and showing how the concierge is able to develop a relationship with a Japanese widower who moves into the apartment building. The girl's filming her sister throughout the goldfish bowl is a metaphor for the new look that she's taking at her bourgeois existence. In the end, the girl does start to reconsider her suicidal plans. Achache made a very good movie, one that I truly recommend.

I am now quietly used to going to movie theatres alone (in Italy this is still seen as an "odd" thing), I like it although regretting not exchanging opinion with some company, but this time an old woman was sitting, on her own, next to me, and at the end of the movie, we watched one another with our eyes suffocating some necessary tears, and she said: "how sad, but what a nice movie", I couldn't but agree with her (and innerly hoping I will still be able to go movie theatre, in my older years). "Le herisson" is the cinematographic adaptation of a best selling novel, a real literary case, which I have read, being quite surprised by the idea of making a movie from it, since it is a book where really little happens, and where the writer loves, and manages to play with the aesthetic, intellectual and emotional power of words.

But the young director Mona Achache managed to transpose the subtlety of the written word, in that she focused on the three main characters perfectly. They are three delicate souls, perceived by others as "odd", eccentric, different: Renée, the caretaker, apparently dowdy and ignorant, on the contrary very cultured and hiding a sensitive soul, Paloma , the "complicated", but in reality deep young girl, simply disregarding the void adult world, and the amazing Kakuro, the prototype of what a real man should be, refined in his soul, respectful, tactful. And you come to ask yourself why such high human qualities are viewed as odd, while they should be the normal way of living! In today's standardized, vulgar world, I perceived the movie as an effective antidote, supporting with strength the value of the uniqueness of the single human being. It is also a praise of delicacy and slowness, of the magic of a single spoken word or a single kind gesture, or a single soft glance: a few things happen, and a few things are said, simply because for a full life, we don't need to see or hear many things , we need a few but good things.

Despite its slowness, the movie is never boring, on the contrary I felt raptured by the delicacy and the calmness of these characters, wonderfully interpreted by three talented and actors. I identified myself also with the little Paloma, probably because she reminded me at her own age, when I liked being on my own, finding my secret refuge, where I could stay alone with my thoughts, as I grew up I realized how people could have seen my as a "difficult", even problematic child, but also fully realized how it is easy to be judged because different from the mass, but how important to keep your real inner precious world alive. Go and see it, you will be enchanted by these three simple, plain, but magic characters.