Une vraie jeune fille (1976)

Director:

Catherine Breillat

Writers:

Catherine Breillat (novel)
Catherine Breillat (screenplay)

Release Date:

28 April 1999 (France)

Genre:

Drama

Tagline:

A surreal voyage into adolescent sexuality.

Plot:

August, 1963; Alice, 14, an only child, and physically well developed, is home for vacation. She's moody...

Plot Keywords:

Candle | Egg | Sawmill | Vomit | Diary

Cast

Charlotte Alexandra	...	Alice Bonnard
Hiram Keller	...	Pierre-Evariste Renard / 'Jim' / 'Earthworm Jim'
Rita Maiden	...	Mrs. Bonnard (as Rita Meiden)
Bruno Balp	...	Mr. Bonnard
Georges Guéret	...	Martial (as Georges Gueret)
Shirley Stoler	...	Grocer in Aupom
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Thierry Roland	...	TV commentator (voice) (archive footage)

Also Known As:

A Real Young Girl (USA)
A Real Young Lady (International: English title)

Runtime:

93 min | Canada:89 min | USA:89 min

Country:

France

Language:

French

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Canada:18+ (Quebec) | France:-16 | Hong Kong:III | Japan:R-18 | USA:Unrated

Company:

Artédis

Goofs:

Continuity: The calendar inside the doorway of the Bonnard home indicates that it's August, 1964; however, TV shows pertaining to the death of Monseigneur Fernand Maillet and the resignation of George Pompidou's first government suggest that it's only 1963, and a TV broadcast of Jacques Anquetil's fourth Tour de France victory suggests that at least one scene with the calendar is set on July 14 (Bastille Day), 1963.

Quotes:

Alice Bonnard: I hate people. They complicate me.

Movie Connections:

Featured in "SexTV: Nobuyoshi Araki/The Music of X: The Soundtrack of Sex/Catherine Breillat (#5.2)" (2002)

Soundtrack:

Le danger c'est de trop aimer

A visceral pre-figurative work.

The first film from Catherine Breillat, the director of "Romance" ('99), that had, upon it's completion in 1975, caused a ratings scandal in France and, beyond being censored, was banned outright. Tellingly, this year (2000) it finally arrived, with little fanfare, on a screen in Paris as, literally across the street at the MK2 Odeon, another controversial film "Baise-Moi" (2000) was causing riots that led to the film being pulled from cinemas.

"Une Vraie Jeune Fille" showcases all of the obsessions that mark Breillat's work through to "Romance" and in a way it is almost more interesting to see the film in retrospect, in light of the films that she made after it, as the lietmotifs present in all were not only prefigured in the first film, but this first film also comments on them.

A girl returns to her parents house from boarding school for the summer. The situation is stifiling and her father's incestuous desires are more than just suggested, though the girl does little to disuade them. She becomes obsessed with a blue collar employee of her father's and his indifference toward her only increases his presence in her numerous sexual fantasies.

The film is visceral and, while the camera is often highly subjective, it maintains, via a cool facade deliberately imitating that of 70's soft porn, that lends it a level of objectivity often entirely absent in American cinema (This film will, incidentally, never reach American screens).

In the same way that "Romance" operates, this film, while exploring detailed fantasies, uses its objectivity to resist any psychoanalyzation of its protagonist. It presents only the events, real events merge with fantasy to lend the pornographic journey/discovery a somewhat hallucinatory aspect

Breillat has found a niche as a filmmaker her films are cool to the touch without being deconstructive, placing her somwhere between Godard and pornography and as a result her films lack a certain element of humanity that prevent them from transcending this niche.