Le Souffle

David is the fatherless image of adolescent youth, rake-thin, spotty and with an ill-defined sense-of-being, provided by his uncle's friends. Living on a poor farm, deep in the backwaters of rural France, summer passes by, but today is special, today David is allowed to drink with the adults. Today, in more ways than one, he takes the next step toward becoming a man.

Presented in harsh monochrome, the farm is given a timeless artistic quality, contrasting the grizzled and swarthy workers as they go about their business, slaughtering the animals and drinking the wine. David (Pierre-Louis Bonnetblanc) is rebellious and discontented, wishing for the excitement of the city, combined with the freedom of the countryside.

He wants to be a wolf, a predator. He has one friend in Matthieu (Laurent Simon), a similarly disenchanted boy, and an unreachable girlfriend, Aurore (Laure Magadoux), who dances in his mind, out of reach.

The film sets us inside his head, seeing his life, his dreams and his nightmares, as he engages in the ritualistic drinking and the slaughter of animals. It is deeply in debt to many of the classics of French cinema, from the brazen characters of Godard, to the sullen youth of Truffaut.

The use of non-professional actors as the farmhands is an excellent choice for writer/director Damien Odoul, allowing him to realise the setting brilliantly. When you see these men, you see the physical scars of a lifetime of hard work and the morals of generations of constricted thought. We are taken for a ride through an alien land, a reality far removed from our own.

Although the work is artistically impressive, and the cinematography excellent, you find yourself asking, is this an original and good movie? At what point does an homage become plagiarism?

Somewhat trite and overly pretentious at times, this debut feature from Odoul is provocative and unsettling, with exceptional performances all round.