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L'enfant (2005)
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Overview
User Rating:
Release Date:
14 September 2005 (Belgium) morePlot:
Bruno and Sonia, a young couple living off her benefit and the thefts committed by his gang, have a new source of money: their newborn son. full summary | add synopsisAwards:
11 wins & 12 nominations moreNewsDesk:
(7 articles)
Top 50 Hottest Young Actresses - Top 20 (From The Movie Fanatic. 5 July 2009, 4:22 AM, PDT)
Top 50 Hottest Young Actresses - Top 20
(From The Movie Fanatic. 5 July 2009, 4:22 AM, PDT)
User Comments:
Salt of the Earth moreCast
(Cast overview, first billed only)| Jérémie Renier | ... | Bruno | |
| Déborah François | ... | Sonia | |
| Jérémie Segard | ... | Steve | |
| Fabrizio Rongione | ... | Jeune Bandit | |
| Olivier Gourmet | ... | Policier en civil | |
| Anne Gerard | ... | Commerçante (as Anne Gérard) | |
| Bernard Marbaix | ... | Commerçant | |
| Jean-Claude Boniverd | ... | Le Policier en civil | |
| Frédéric Bodson | ... | Bandit plus âgé | |
| Marie-Rose Roland | ... | Une infirmière | |
| Leon Michaux | ... | Policier Commissariat (as Léon Michaux) | |
| Delphine Tomson | ... | La fille aux cheveux rouges | |
| Stéphane Marsin | ... | Jeune Homme | |
| Samuel De Ryck | ... | Thomas | |
| François Olivier | ... | Remy |
Additional Details
MPAA:
Rated R for brief language.Parents Guide:
Add content advisory for parentsRuntime:
France:95 min | France:100 min | USA:100 min | Argentina:95 minLanguage:
FrenchColor:
ColorAspect Ratio:
1.66 : 1 moreSound Mix:
Dolby DigitalCertification:
Netherlands:AL | Switzerland:14 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:14 (canton of Geneva) | Belgium:KT | USA:R | Czech Republic:15 | Taiwan:GP | Sweden:11 | Singapore:PG | UK:12A | Australia:M | Finland:K-11 | Argentina:16 | Brazil:12 | Brazil:16 (Rio de Janeiro International Film Festival) | Hungary:16 | Portugal:M/12 | Hong Kong:IIA | South Korea:12Fun Stuff
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Like a Chekov short story, simple, spare, and POW, right to the gut.
The totally marginal, a petty thief and his welfare girlfriend, clutching that most vulnerable and pathetic of all creatures, a newborn, dodge the indifferent menace of malicious streets. And the father, a total scamp and immature airhead, is barely worthy of contempt. So how do you make a fine movie out of this?
The Dardennes have eked a specialized cinematic niche for themselves: Ascetic social realism, the moral dilemmas of the European lower rungs and blue collar, stripped of adornment, yet somehow universal.
Bruno doesn't bother visiting his girlfriend in the hospital while she's having his baby. She has a problem even finding him when she gets out. Without her knowledge, or permission, he sublets her apartment while she's in labor, and is sleeping under a bridge. The new family is homeless.
But they're children, urban peasants, hardly different from Hardy's. The scenes establishing their relationship, short, prompt, are brutally sweet.
Then he sells the baby.
That Bruno isn't capable of great complexity limits the film. Watching a dope screw up makes for a haphazard, at times dull, ride -- you think he deserves the worst, think the baby is better off without him. Still, a sure Dostoevskian compass guides his inchoate moral choices.
Though not as compelling or rich as "Rosetta" (my favorite) or "La Promesse" (the crowds' favorite), or nuanced as "Le Fils," I still urge you to hang in there. The final scene delivers.
PS. I WILL be seeing the next Dardennes' film, no question.
PPS. Bruno is in a sense an untouched, unformed, unsocialized tabla raza, yes, OK, an "enfant," the human animal, neither good nor bad. The movie delves into his inherent social, moral nature -- "Is man good or bad?" What a sophomoric, embarrassing question you reply, in these pseudohip times of ours. When he lifts the 14 year-old on his back out of the deathly frozen black river, the child groaning piteously in pain, it is a "Christian" moment. God Save Our Souls (and I'm not remotely Christian).