User Reviews

One realizes not everything is all right between Lena and Michel. They are seen momentarily in deep discussion, but their two daughters do not get a whiff of what is really happening. The girls, Frederique and Sophie, are wiser than their tender years indicate. Lena packs the girl for their summer at a rented house at the seaside resort of La Baule in the Loire-Atlantique department, where Lena and her married sister, Bella, and their families spend the summer.

It was the late 1950s in France, a time marked by the conflict in Algeria. The children, accompanied by Odette, come to the house near the ocean where they will intermingle with their cousins. It is also at the resort where Frederique and Sophie will get the news about their parent's irrevocable divorce. Lena cannot stay with Mihel any longer. In fact, she shows a bit of carelessness as her lover from Lyon, Jean-Claude, a sculptor, joins her on his way to America, something he would like her to do.

The summer days are spent on the beach, where with the girls irritating their caretaker, Odette, get in trouble when their pranks get out of hand. Lena is determined to settle with the girls in Paris, but she badly needs money that without Michel's help will be almost impossible. Her brother-in-law promises help, but it might not be adequate for the needs. Michel wants to go back, but one realizes they have nothing left of what they once felt.

A loving tribute by Diane Kurys, a director who has examined her life in different portraits she has created for the screen. Her stories take an intimate view of family life, or the lack of it, as in this case. The film is seen from Frederique's point of view, basically. All that is going on with her mother is examined by the young girl, still too young to really be able to digest the vibes she witnesses around her parents. It is also Frederique's awakening to young love, because she is attracted to her older cousin, something that is tole in subtle ways by Ms. Kurys.

The director, who wrote her own screenplay in collaboration with Alain Le Henry, examines her past with an openness that is refreshing. She handles her cast well and was rewarded with an excellent Natalie Baye as Lena. The other surprise in the film is Julie Bataille, who makes an impression as Frederique. The supporting players are wonderful in their contribution to the viewer's enjoyment of the film. Richard Berry, Vincent Lindon, Jean-Pierre Bacri, Zabou, a young Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi and the young children seen as the cousins.

Philippe Sarde contributed with the score which plays in the background, mingled with pop songs of that era. The cinematography is credited to Fabio Conversi and Giuseppe Lanci, which captures the flavor of a typical summer French resort by the sea.

This was the fifth of the nine films Diane Kurys has so far directed and the third of three (Diabolo Menthe, Coup de Foudre being the others) that deal with her own experiences in childhood and adolescence. In the second film, Coup de Foudre, the character based on Kury's own mother and fictionalised as Lena was played by Isabelle Huppert whilst here Nathalie Baye assumes the role opposite Richard Berry as husband/father Michel. The action has moved on from the war and post-war years in Lyon (Kury's own home town) to the late 1950s when thirteen year old Frederique (Julie Bataille), the closest character to the young Kurys herself and her eight year old sister Sophie are taken by their Nanny Odette (Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi) to the seaside for the summer vacation. A pre-credit sequence reveals to us the gulf (explored first in Coup de Foudre) that now exists between the parents and which the sisters are perhaps subconsciously aware. At the last minute - literally at the railway station itself - they realize that Lena will not accompany them. Once established at the resort they take out their frustration on Odette as a ploy to force their mother to join them but when she does so she spends more time with a lover Claude (Vincent Lindon) than with them. Also on hand are Leon (Jean-Pierre Bacri and the highly fertile Bella (Zabou) and when Michel shows up he deliberately destroys the car that symbolised Lena's independence and engages in a verbal and physical quarrel with Lena that is so intense that Frederique threatens to kill herself with a shard of glass broken during their fighting. This is an outstanding film in which the pain of adolescence is once-removed through the filter of nostalgia and replete with the tiny 'touches' - popular songs of the day, etc - that we use as signposts to lead us back into the past. Fifteen years on it's fascinating to see the younger versions of six exceptional French actors two of whom (Zabou with Se Souvenirs des belles chooses, and Bruni-Tedeschi with Il est plus facile pour un chameau ...) would go on to direct outstanding films themselves. I can't recommend this one highly enough.

I borrowed La Baule-les Pins from the library at l'Alliance Francaise de la Chicago. I watched it without subtitles first then rewatched it with subtitles. I rewatched several chapters repeatedly as not to miss a thing. La Baule-les Pins in is Brittany, one of the most beautiful provences in France if it is possible to call one provence more beautiful than another. Obviously, the village is on the Atlantic Ocean. I watched the village as much as the story! I would roughly compare the film to Revolutionary Road or Far From Heaven as both films highlight the struggles of women in the 50s. This film depicts a family that goes through a divorce in 1958. At the time the few people that spoke openly about divorce. And as for telling a child what is going on? Out of the question. Things were pretty much on a don't ask, don't tell basis. No one discussed family crisis outside of the family. If it was discussed within the family it was a war, not a discussion. If there were conflict resolution mediators I had never heard about them because no one would say they were engaged in managing a family crisis! Aside from several parts of the film which are quite obvious I noted one bit of French tradition I detest. So many French people abandon their pets when it's vacation time. If you aren't French you might not understand the tragedy here. Several French animal welfare groups are trying to educate the public not to do this. Part of the film those who lived through war know well. The mother & her sister are not really sisters. They had lost parents during WWII. They were a blended family. They made very lovely sisters. In conclusion I am giving this spoiler. The doll is very symbolic in this film. Notice how it is treated in the very beginning of the film compared to the end. How does the little girl's feeling's change from beginning to end? The children were very good actors. I loved all the characters. The story is rich. The sets cannot be better; lovely houses, gardens, the beach, and there were oyster farms. You have to have an eye to catch the oyster farms! This movie has everything I love about film; drama, rich characters, beauty, history, traditions both good & bad, and France.