User Reviews

"Pauline" is a French live action short film from 2010, so this one has its 10th anniversary this year and probably more people have seen it in the last 2 years than right after it was released. The reason is that these slightly under eight minutes were directed by Céline Sciamma, who was extremely successful with hew new full feature film not too long ago. Of course seeing that one and seeing this one here you could wonder if she is also capable of delivering quality when it comes to films that are not about lesbian characters, but honestly as long as the quality is as high as it is on these two projects, I will not complain. This is a really simplistic film. The camera is still on one character who lies on a bed and tells us her story, how she had her first period, how she started dating her best friend, how she realized she may be more into women than men, how this resulted in homophobia from said "best friend" and also from a colleague of her father (if I remember correctly), how she struggled with her parents take on this suvject and how she is eventually full of hope to find true happiness and the reason for the latter is what we see at the very end of the movie. The twist here is that she has not told all this to us, but to her (new) girlfriend. The latter is played by Adèle Haenel and by now, she is certainly more known than the one who plays the lead actress. That one would be Anaïs Demoustier and she is successful nonetheless and many French film buffs will know her, but Haenel is also known abroad for sure. I liked them both in here, although Haenel really has almost nothing to work with here. Still, always nice if filmmakers work together with cast members over such a long period and Haenel is also in the recent film I mentioned early on, the big success. Now, as for this one here, the script, i.e. the spoken words (or at least the general idea) was created by Daphné Charbonneau and this is her only filmmaking credit and looking at how this one already relatively old (even if 2010 still sounds so close), it's probably gonna stay that way. It's tough to find a flaw with this film. It is as simplistic as entertaining and it is so nice to find a gay-themed movie (short movie, especially) that delivers and does not need to be blatantly in your face, does not need any unrealistic fake drama or pseudo-important unrealistic happiness (that would have been her crush kissing her back back in the day) and instead manages to be quietly captivating and make an impact from that perspective. Also the end is really also a nice way to close this film and put a smile on audience's lips. Maybe if you dig deep enough, you could say that what Pauline tells in here is a bit too much, spans over too much time and it does not feel too realistic that she elaborates on so many things within such a period of time and it would have felt more realistic if she had spoken to her partner about one subject only, but like I said this is really me digging deep here for a flaw. I enjoyed it a lot, even thought briefly about giving it 4 stars out of 5 and it comes pretty close. Still, one of my preferred short films from 2010 and French language is so beautiful, even if I did not understand too much. Luckily, there were English subtitles. That's all. Go watch it. Also a really nice appetizer if you plan on giving "Portrait de la jeune fille en feu" a rewatch. No hesitation for me here in giving this one a thumbs-up.