"Fat Girl" is unrated so probably will never be shown in sex ed classes for 14-year-old girls willing to read the subtitles of a French film. Too bad.
Written and directed by Catherine Breillat, whose other controversial movies about girls and sex I've somehow missed and will now catch up on, the original title of "A ma soeur!" (to, or maybe colloquially for, my sister) makes a lot more sense.
But not since the very scary "Smooth Talk" have I seen the seduction of a pretty teen-ager by a hunky older guy shown so effectively, as this is a whole lot more explicit and sensually realistic in how they interact in a cagey game of alluring naiveté vs. determined persuasion.
Unlike "American Beauty" whose quasi-pedophilia I found disturbing, this is a sophisticated view of the powerful forces unleashed between a guy young enough to be attracted yet old enough to know better, and a girl old enough to be attracted yet young enough not to know better. Is he the banality of evil, an update of Sportin' Life or the snake -- or is he just being a guy? In class, the teacher could stop the tape in the middle of the dialog and action, and say "Whoa, girls, what could you say when he says that? When he does that? When you feel like that?"
And we watch this all played out in a fascinating way, from the viewpoint of, with devastating impact on, her younger, titular sister who has to endure an up close and personal intimacy with them under the noses of oblivious parents.
While the sibling relationship is the anchor, the ending may be a culminating precautionary statement on a very negative view of the battle of the sexes, but no one walking out of the theater was sure.
The Ontario Film Review Board missed the educational point in censoring the film, but I concur that it's a disturbing film.
Listening to Top 40 radio on the way home sure made me suspicious of all those declarations of love pouring out from all those guys.
Coincidentally, I re-saw the Rohmer film "Pauline on the Beach" hours later on IFC and now see that Breillat is making a dark commentary on that classic, both riffing off a 14-year-old on vacation amidst a sexual whirligig; the French may have a different reaction than me.
(originally written 10/27/2001)
Written and directed by Catherine Breillat, whose other controversial movies about girls and sex I've somehow missed and will now catch up on, the original title of "A ma soeur!" (to, or maybe colloquially for, my sister) makes a lot more sense.
But not since the very scary "Smooth Talk" have I seen the seduction of a pretty teen-ager by a hunky older guy shown so effectively, as this is a whole lot more explicit and sensually realistic in how they interact in a cagey game of alluring naiveté vs. determined persuasion.
Unlike "American Beauty" whose quasi-pedophilia I found disturbing, this is a sophisticated view of the powerful forces unleashed between a guy young enough to be attracted yet old enough to know better, and a girl old enough to be attracted yet young enough not to know better. Is he the banality of evil, an update of Sportin' Life or the snake -- or is he just being a guy? In class, the teacher could stop the tape in the middle of the dialog and action, and say "Whoa, girls, what could you say when he says that? When he does that? When you feel like that?"
And we watch this all played out in a fascinating way, from the viewpoint of, with devastating impact on, her younger, titular sister who has to endure an up close and personal intimacy with them under the noses of oblivious parents.
While the sibling relationship is the anchor, the ending may be a culminating precautionary statement on a very negative view of the battle of the sexes, but no one walking out of the theater was sure.
The Ontario Film Review Board missed the educational point in censoring the film, but I concur that it's a disturbing film.
Listening to Top 40 radio on the way home sure made me suspicious of all those declarations of love pouring out from all those guys.
Coincidentally, I re-saw the Rohmer film "Pauline on the Beach" hours later on IFC and now see that Breillat is making a dark commentary on that classic, both riffing off a 14-year-old on vacation amidst a sexual whirligig; the French may have a different reaction than me.
(originally written 10/27/2001)